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'BIOGRAPHY 



MILLARD FILLMORE. 




BUFFALO: 

THOMAS & LATHROPS, PUBLISHERS, 

1856. 






Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1856, 
By THOMAS & LATHROPS, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Northern Dis- 
trict of New York. 



CONTENTS, 



PAGE. 

Introduction, ....,.,., 5 



CHAPTER I. 

His Birth, Ancestors, and Early Life, . . . . lY 

CHAPTER II. 
Mr. Fillmore's Entrance into Public Life, . . , .31 

CHAPTER III. 

Mr. Fillmore's Career in Congress, 44 

CHAPTER IV. 
The Twenty-Seventh Congress, . 59 

CHAPTER V. 
The Presidential Campaign op 1844, *I9 

CHAPTER VI. 

Elected Comptroller op New York, 96 

CHAPTER VII. 

'Vice-President op the United States, . . . . lOG 



IV CONTENTS. 

PAGE. 

CHAPTER Till. 

Mr. Fillmore President op the United States, . . .119 

CHAPTER IX. 

The Compromise Measures and Fugitive Slave Law, . . 129 
« 

chapter X. 
First Annual Message, « . .156 

chapter XI. 
Cuba and t^e Fillibusters, 179 

chapter XII. 
Exploring Expeditions to Foreign Countries, . . . 200 

CHAPTER XIII. 

American Principles, 205 



INTRODUCTION. 



In the spring of 1853, Millard Fillmore, the subject of 
the following biographical sketch, retired from the Presidency. 
Several of our most illustrious statesmen, who, at the com- 
mencement of his administration, were master-spirits in the 
national councils, had been gathered to their fathers. Cal- 
houn, indeed, had been summoned away before the dispensa- 
tion of Providence which placed a new pilot at the helm of 
State, and before the portentous storm, then raging, had 
gathered all its blackness. His last speech in the Senate, 
read for him by a friend because he was too feeble to dehver 
it, is pervaded by dark forebodings scarcely relieved by a 
gleam of hope. His two great compeers, who sympathized 
in his apprehensions, although they did not share in his 
despondency, were still spared to the country, and, at the 
commencement of Mr. Fillmore's administration, were leading 
members of the Senate. Clay had, some years before, bid a 
formal, and, as he supposed, a final farewell to this theater 
of his labors; but a great and perilous crisis had now sum- 
moned him again to the service of his country. Webster, 



VI INTRODUCTION. 

then also in the Senate^ had recently put forth one of the 
most powerful eflforts of his eloquence for the preservation of 
the endangered Union. Although, to use his own language, 
"the imprisoned winds are let loose" — although "the east, 
the west, the north, and the stormy south, all combine to 
throw the whole ocean into agitation, to toss its billows to the 
skies, and to disclose its profoundest depths," he would neither 
shrink from his duty nor abandon hope. " I am looking out 
for no fragment," he says, " upon which to float away from 
the wreck, if wreck there must be, but for the good of the 
•whole, and the preservation of the whole ; and there is that 
which will keep me to my duty during this struggle, whether 
the sun and stars shall appear, or shall not appear for 
many days." 

It was in the midst of an agitation, which thus aroused the 
energies — in the midst of dangers which thus alarmed the 
apprehensions of our greatest and most experienced statesmen, 
that the administration of Millard Fillmore commenced. 
Before he had been two months in power, there was a lull in 
the storm — the crisis had passed — and although a heavy 
ground-swell continued, for some time, to mark the violence 
of the recent tempest, the country was fast settling into tran- 
quillity. As the ablest men of both political parties had lent 
their influence to secure the compromise, so they now united 
to give it stability by all the combined weight of their charac- 
ters. Two years afterwards, both the great political parties, 
into which the country was then divided, solemnly endorsed 
it, in their national conventions, as the final settlement of a 
most dangerous controversy. 



INTRODUCTION. VII 

But no sooner liad the administration whicli had brought 
about this auspicious result retired from power, than other 
counsels beo-an to prevail. The first Congress that met after 
the inauguration of President Pierce, signalized itself by 
carrying' out his wishes in the repeal of a compromise of more 
than thirty years' standing, regarded by the country as an 
inviolable compact. Thus were the flood-gates of sectional 
agitation wantonly re-opened, and during the whole period of 
the present Democratic administration, the country has been 
distracted by heated controversies, on a subject which it was 
supposed the compromise of 1850 had withdrawn forever from 
the arena of national politics. 

We are still in the midst of these controversies. Two of 
the three great parties into which the country is nojv divided, 
insist on making the slavery question the leading issue in the 
approaching presidential campaign. Granting the importance 
of this question to be as great as these parties contend, in 
whose wisdom can the American people so fully confide to 
preside over its settlement, as in that of the statesman who, 
three years ago, extricated the country from the same dangers 
into which the Democratic party has re-plunged it? He who 
has once piloted the tempest-tossed ship into a safe harbor, 
is the most suitable man to be again placed at the helm, when 
her moorings have been wantonly severed, and she is again 
drifting on the same stormy sea, exposed to be split on the 
same dangerous rocks. 

But the present importance of the slavery question is 
greatly over-rated. The repeal of the Missouri compromise, 
which had no other object than to gain the favor of the South 



ViLl INTRODUCTION. 

by opening Kansas to slavery, will injure the interest it was 
intended to promote. Kansas is as certain to be a free State 
as if the Missouri compromise were standing to-day, intact 
and irrepealable. So far as relates to territorial extension for 
their peculiar institutions, the South have gained nothing — 
the North lost nothing. Other laws than the Missouri com- 
promise — laws which no congressional enactment can repeal 
— the laws of chmate and soil — laws which govern emigra- 
tion, and, above all, laws written on the human heart, have 
decreed the exclusion of slavery from the whole territory to 
which the Missouri compromise appUed. The pretended 
friends of the South have not only conferred no benefit on 
that section of the country, but have called into existence the 
most formfdable party that has ever been arj^ayed against 
southern interests, and armed that party with specious and 
plausible arguments. Will the South support a policy so 
fruitless in good, a policy so teeming with evil, to them- 
selves ? Will they act with a party that has wantonly revived 
an agitation which it was clearly foreseen would peril their most 
cherished interests ? So far as regards the spread of slavery, 
nothing has been gained or lost by the repeal of the compro- 
mise. That repeal is simply a fountain of political excitement, 
furnishing topics of declamation to demagogues who aim to 
purchase power at the expense of the public tranquillity. The 
American party, seeing that neither section of the country 
has anything to gain by the continuance of the controversy, 
refuse to take any part in it, except for the purpose of 
restoring peace. 



INTRODUCTION. 12 

As the party Tvhicli has nommated Mr. Fillmore now 
enters a presidential contest for the first time, it may not be 
inappropriate, before sketching the history of its candidate, to 
say a fe\Y words of its principles. They make no appeal to a 
love of novelty, to that reckless passion for change which 
delights in perpetual innovation. They address themselves, 
on the contrary, to tJie sober sense, the calm conservative sen- 
timent of the country. They are founded on patriotism — 
the source of all public virtue, the parent of all the great 
deeds that emblazon the pages of history. Love for the land 
that gave us birth — that instinctive feehng which alike leads 
men to repel the invader, and to preserve their institutions 
from the unhallowed touch of foreign influence — that ennobling 
sentiment which so constantly triumphs over the strongest of 
the selfish instincts, the love of life — which pours out its 
blood hke water in its country's cause and counts it glory — 
which feels that its native air is tainted and no longer worth 
breathing — its native soil polluted, and fit only to aflford 
graves for its sons, when they cease to be its sole sovereigns 
— this sentiment it is on which the American party is built, 
and on which it rests its hopes for the success of its funda- 
mental maxim, that Americans shall rule America. 

The principle is not new. Our fathers declared it when 
they cast off their allegiance to the British crown, and refused 
to be taxed by a foreign parliament. They embodied it in 
the Constitution of the country when they inserted in that 
insti'ument a provision that the two highest officers of the gov- 
ernment — the President and Vice-president of the United 

♦States — shall be native-born citizens. They recognized it in 
1* 



X HffTRODUCTION. 

the provisions of the same instrument which forbid the election 
of any person to the United States Senate who has not resided 
in tlie country' nine years in addition to the period Congress 
might require for naturalization, or of any person to the 
House of Representatives whose residence has not extended 
seven years beyond the same period. The length of time 
aliens shall reside in the country before they can become 
citi^ns, was not fixed by the Constitution, but wisely left to 
the discretion of Congress. Circumstances might arise requir- 
ing an extension of the period, and Congress was clothed with 
the power to extend it as the exigencies of the country and 
the safety of its institutions should render expedient. 

Why raise an impassable barrier against a naturalized citi- 
zen becoming eligible, by any length of residence, to either 
of the highest offices ? Why take such an apparent excess of 
precaution as to exclude from those offices a person born on 
ship-board during the voyage of his parents hither and wholly 
educated in this country ? We put the question to those who 
ridicule the idea of danwr to our institutions from foreign 
influence, and ask if all this pains was taken to guard against 
an unreal danger ? 

From the preponderance of the native over the foreign pop- 
ulation, a calculation of probabilities will show that there must 
always be a large majority of native-born members of both 
Houses of Congress. As the framers of the Constitution must 
have foreseen that the naturalized members would always be 
■a minorit}^ it clearly follows that they apprehended danger 
from the influence of even a few who might retain their foreign 
prejudices and sympathies, and so excluded foreigners from 



INTRODUOTION. XI 

tlie national councils for a long period after they had acquired 
the privilege of citizenship. 

The power granted to Congress over the whole subject of 
naturalizaltion, furnishes another conclusive argument in favor 
of the same position. It was foreseen that the future increase 
of immigration might become so great, and the danger from 
foreign influence so augmented, that any rule of naturalization 
inserted in the Constitution would prove ineffectual against the 
increased pressure of the evil. Congress was, therefore, in- 
vested with unlimited discretion, and left athberty to deal with 
the danger according to the demands of its growing magnitude. 

The first Congress judged a residence of five years a sufii- 
cient preparation for citizenship. At that time, and for a long 
period previous, nearly all our immigrants came from Great 
Britain. The present facilities for crossing the ocean did not 
exist; the voyage had not become so cheap as to place it 
within the means of the poorest part of the population, nor 
was there in this country the great demand for rude and 
unskilled labor which the growth of our cities and our exten- 
sive public works have since created. The bulk of our immi- 
grant population was, at that time, more intelligent and 
respectable than it is now, and furnished materials for a 
better class of citizens. They were nearly all Protestants; 
a large. majority of them were Englishmen. As Protestants, 
they were inaccessible to the influence of a foreign hierarchy. 
As Englishmen, they had come to live under a government 
founded on the model of the British Constitution, and which, in 
copjnng from that model, had retained a great deal more than 
it discarded. Comparatively little transformation of character 



Xll INTRODTJCTION. 

was needed to bring such immigrants into full sympathy with 
our sentiments, into perfect harmony with our institutions. 

Within the last twenty years all this has changed. Our 
immigrants are no longer mainly Protestants. A majority of 
them no longer come from the country whose language we 
speak, by whose literature our minds are formed, from whom 
we have borrowed the habeas corpus, trial by jury, represen- 
tative government, and the common law. We receive now, 
with a great many estimable, industrious, self-respecting- 
people, the very dregs and scum of the population of Europe. 
All that is benighted by ignorance — all that is debased by 
superstition — all that is squahd by poverty^ all that is 
besotted by intemperance — all that is detestable in morals — 
all that is odious and abominable by crime — have, for the 
last few years, been poured upon our shores, to taint our moral 
atmosphere, and add to the corruption of our large cities. 
Without any knowledge of our institutions — without even any 
acquaintance with our language, they are invested with the 
most sacred of our political privileges — the elective franchise 
— and either sell their votes directly to demagogues for some 
paltry bribe, or yield them indirectly through the influence 
of priests, whose wishes they are too superstitious to resist. 
If our fathers thought it necessary to guard so carefully 
against foreign influence when our immigrants, comparatively 
few in numbers, were of our own blood and lineage, our own 
language and religion, and our own habits of thought, who can 
consistently say that the necessity is not greatly enhanced, when, 
besides the alarming increase of numbers, the character of our 
foreign population has become so much changed for the worse ? 



INTRODUCTION. Xlll 

Another consideration of great weight iq this connection, is 
derived from the local laws of the several States at the adop- 
tion of the Constitution, and the passage of the present 
naturalization law. It is well known that the State Consti- 
tutions then required a property qualification of some kind, 
generally a freehold, as preliminary to the right of suffrage. 
At that time an alien, when naturalized, did not necessarily 
become a voter. Under the then existing State regulations, 
none of that class of foreigners whose abuse of the elective 
franchise has given origin to the American party, would have 
been suffered to approach a ballot-box. None except those 
who had some stake in the government were allowed a voice 
in its policy. The extension of suffrage till it has, in most of 
the States, become universal, seems a wise change, when 
considered in relation to our native population. With the 
enlightened love of country which springs from American 
birth and education; with the habits of industry, thrift and 
enterprise so characteristic of our people, which makes the 
acquisition of property and social position the common aim of 
all; universal suffrage is not only free from danger, but is as 
wise and just as it is safe. But the great increase of an igno- 
rant and debased foreign population creates an imperative 
necessity for either restoring the property qualification, or 
altering the naturalization laws. At all events, it must be 
admitted, that naturalized citizens wield far more political 
power, in proportion to their numbers, than if the possession 
of a freehold had remained a qualification for the right of suf- 
frage. The law as it stands was framed with reference to a 
different condition of things from that in which it now operates. 



Xiv INTRODUCTION. 

When it was enacted, our foreign population was neither so 
numerous, so ignorant, nor so dissimilar to ourselves as it has 
since become ; nor was it immediately invested with the right 
of suffrage, b}^ the mere possession of naturalization papers; 
and, above all, the country at that time had no experience 
of the abuses of which we have been witnesses within a more 
recent period. 

To remedy the evils introduced into the .politics of the 
country by demagogues who pander to the prejudices and 
purchase the votes of foreigners — to remove the corruption 
which taints the fountains of power — to restore to Americans 
the influence which rightfully belongs to them in the govern- 
ment of their own country — to rekindle the fires of patriotism, 
and foster that national spirit which is at once the cheapest 
defence of the country and the surest conservator of its insti- 
tutions — these are the purposes of the American party, which 
now enters the field for the first time with a candidate for the 
highest oflSce of the government. That candidate having been 
selected, it is thought that a simple and impartial recital of 
the leading events of his Hfe will be acceptable to the 
American people. 

The task of preparing the following unpretending sketch 
has devolved on the present writer, in consequence of the 
absence from the country of the gentleman whose hterary 
talents and long personal association wilh Mr. Fillmore would 
render him the most suitable biographer of his distinguished 
friend. I refer to Dr. Thomas M. Foote, late Minister to 
Austria; who, summer before last, was urgently solicited by 
some of Mr. Fillmore's friends to write the history of his 



INTRODUCTION. XV 

administration. He at length yielded to their persuasions, 
and promised to prosecute the work. The writer of these 
pages, then in habits of daily intimacy with Dr. Foote, had 
frequent conversations with him relating to the plan, topics, 
arrangement, and mode of execution of the proposed history, 
and was to have assisted him in the composition of some of its 
chapters. The preparation of the work for the press was 
postponed during the autumn of 1854 and the following 
winter, in consequence of Dr. Foote's feeble health, and 
during the summer of 1855, by his occupation in superintend- 
ing the building of a new house. All this while, however, it 
continued to be a frequent topic of conversation; and when, 
last fall. Dr. Foote left the country on his present European 
tour, there seemed a propriety, if, during his absence, circum- 
stances should render advisable the publication of a brief 
sketch of Mr. Fillmore's life, that I should be entriisted with 
its preparation. By abridging the materials Dr. Foote would 
have used in a larger and less ephemeral work, and giving 
more fullness and prominence than he had intended to Mr. 
Fillmore's early history, and his public life previous to his 
elevation to the Presidency, it was thought that a more 
authentic and acceptable biography could be written, than 
would be likely to be produced by any person not conversant 
with Dr. Foote's plan, and without access to his materials. 

I have deemed it proper to make these statements, partly 
as an apology to the reader, but principally to enable him to 
judge of the authenticity of the following hastily written 
sketch, by the opportunities the writer has enjoyed for ac- 
quiring correct information. 



BIOGRAPHY 



MILLARD FILLMORE. 



CHAPTER I. 

HIS BIRTH, ANCESTORS, AND EARLY LIFE. 

Millard Fillmore was born in Western New York, in the 
township of Locke, Cayuga county, on the Ytli of January, 
1800. This settlement in the wilderness was at that time so 
new, that his father was compelled, on the occasion of his 
birth, to walk seven miles in the woods, in the dead of night, 
to the nearest physician, through a fresh fallen snow half knee 
deep, with wolves howling on either side of him as he pressed 
on his errand. I^ot only Mr. Fillmore's father, but his ances- 
tors, for three generations, were pioneers in the forest: the fam- 
ily being a true type of the hardy enterprise of American 
character, whose early mission on this continent was to subdue 
the wilderness, and nourish, amid severe labors, that manly 
self-reliance without which the world would never have heard 
of American Independence or American Institutions. The 
noble oak which stands erect and defies the tornado, is nur- 
tured by no green-house culture, shoots up with no mushroom 
rapidity, but is slowly elaborated by centuries of exposure, its 
fibres becoming tough and firm by long resistance to the rock- 
in o- of rude storms. And so with a national character, that has 
the elements of bold enterprise, and stable, enduring greatness. 



18 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

It is formed and consolidated by long struggles with hardship 
and difi&culty. The unbroken forest which our fathers en- 
countered on these shores, and which it was one of their chief 
labors to fell and clear, was the school ordained by Providenco 
for the acquisition of the self-relying and invincible energy, and 
severe self-denial, which carried the country through the trials 
of the Revolution, and infused a taste for the manly simplicity 
of a repubhcan government. The sturdy strokes of the pio- 
neer's axe not only felled the forest, but formed his own 
character. Of this peculiarly American labor the ancestors of 
Millard Fillmore performed their full share, transmitting from 
generation to generation the manly firmness, vigor, and self- 
reliance, the strong practical sense and moral robustness, to 
which the subject of this biography is indebted for his eminent 
position. 

Mr. Fillmore's ancestry, which had taken root in American 
soil at least four generations before his birth, affords so favor- 
able an exemplification of American character, and furnishes 
so many interesting incidents, that the reader will willingly 
allow us to detain him while we briefly sketch its history. 

The early town records of Essex county, Massachusetts, 
enable us to date the commencement of our narrative more 
than a century and a half ago. If we occasionally copy the 
quaint spelling of .the old town clerks, we shall perhaps convey 
a more distinct impression of those olden times. 

John Fillmore, "saylor," married Abagail, daughter of 
Abraham and Deliverance Tilton, of Ipswich, June 19th, 
1701. Their children were John, born in Ipswich, March 18th, 
1702 ; Ebenezer, born in Beverly, and baptized in Wenham, 
July 21st, 1706 ; and Abagail, born likewise in Beverly, and 
baptized in Wenham, August 1st, 1708. The difference be- 
tween the places of birth and baptism of the two youngest 
of these children, is accounted for by the fact that the church 
in Wenham was the one nearest the residence of their parents, 



PABENTAaE AND ANCESTORS. 19 

the North Parish in Beverly, to which the mother afterwards 
belonged, not being organized till December, 1715. No men- 
tion is made of the baptism of John, the eldest son, as his 
mother did not unite with the church until 1705, three years 
after his birth. 

By a deed executed November 24th, 1704, "Luke Perkins, 
blacksmith, and Martha, his wife," conveyed for £50 to "John 
Fillmore, mariner," a house and barn and two acres of land 
on the road from Wenham to Beverly, near Wenham pond. 
Abagail Fillmore, though called "widow" in 17 11, did not 
administer on her husband's estate till l7l5. This delay is 
accounted for by the fact that being a " saylor " or " mariner," 
he died at sea, and a long interval elapsed before legal evidence 
was obtained of his decease. It was at length ascertriined that on 
a homeward voyage the vessel in which he sailed was captured 
by a French frigate, and the crew carried prisoners to Martin- 
ique, where they suffered all the hardships of a close and cruel 
confinement. This was during Queen Anne's war, which was 
terminated by the treaty of Utrecht in 1 71 3. Before the end 
of the war, these prisoners were exchanged, but nearly all of 
them, John Fillmore among the rest, died on board the cartel- 
ship on their passage home, a circumstance which gave rise 
to the suspicion that they were poisoned by the French. 

The property of which his widow was appointed adminis- 
tratrix, consisted of the real estate already mentioned, which 
was valued by the appraisers at the £50 for which it was pur- 
chased, and personal property valued at £22 13s. 6d., including 
« one bible and sermon books." Abagail Fillmore, the widow, 
who was agdin married in Beverly, November 7th, I7l7, to 
Robert Bell, relinquished the administration of her former 
husband's estate, in March, 1723, when her eldest son, John, 
became of age, who was then appointed administrator, " Abra- 
ham Tilton, carpenter, and William Young, fisherman," being 
his sureties. By a decree of the court, the real estate is 



20 BIOGEAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOEE. 

conveyed to JoHn Fillmore, who immediately conveys it to 
other parties whose names and occupations are preserved in the 
old records. 

This Fillmore estate in Beverly belonged, in 1850, to Col. 
Jesse Sheldon, and is situated near the North Beverly station 
on the Easterij Railroad. The house had not been standing 
for many years, but the cellar was filled up by Col. Sheldon 
after he became owner of the field. The well was still in a 
good state of preservation in 1850, and the cinders, yet visible 
about the premises, bore witness to their having been occupied 
by " Luke Perkins, blacksmith," the original owner who deeded 
it to John Fillmore, the elder. There is a tradition that Whit- 
field held one of his famous revival meetings in the house. 

We have omitted to mention a most daring and remarkable 
exploit, which we will now describe. After the death of his 
father, John Fillmore was apprenticed by his mother to a 
carpenter. Like most boys in humble life who listen to the 
conversation of sailors, he was seized with a passion for the 
sea. Besides the dangers of a sea-faring life, the melancholy 
fate of his father furnished his mother with reasons for resist- 
ing his inclination, and detaining him at his trade. Though 
he yielded to her wishes, he could not repress his thirst for 
adventure, and he continued to importune her to allow him to 
make a voyage. As he approached his majority, his mother, 
finding his passion for a sailor's life unabated, reluctantly 
yielded her consent to its indulgence, on condition that instead 
of p-oino' to the West Indies, with which the commerce of .the 
colonies was mostly carried on, he would merely make a fishing 
voyage to the banks of Newfoundland. He accordingly 
shipped for a fishing voyage on board the sloop Dolphin, of 
Cape Ann, Mark Haskell, skipper. The sloop had scarcely 
reached her destination, when she was surprised by what 
proved to be a pirate ship, commanded by John Phillips, a 
noted pirate who then infested the American waters. The 



A DARING EXPLOIT. 21 

discovery was made too late for escape ; the crew was too 
weak to resist; and Haskell could only abide his fate and 
quietly await the event. When the pirate came alongside, a 
boat was sent to the sloop, demanding of its master who he 
was and where he was bound. From this boat's crew Haskell 
learned the character of the ship which had approached him. 
His crew, being mostly young, were struck with consternation 
on finding that they were in the power of Captain Phillips, 
the notorious pirate, from whose cruelty they had everything 
to dread. 

They were soon boarded by another boat from the pirate, 
among whose crew Fillmore recognized a young man, three 
years his senior, named White, whom he had formerly known 
as a tailor's apprentice. When this boat returned to the ship, 
Phillips ascertained that there was no property which he wanted 
on board the sloop, but White mentioned young Fillmore to 
him, describing him as a bold, stout, resolute fellow, who would 
make a valuable addition to his crew. , Phillips accordingly 
sent a boat again to the sloop, demanding the surrender of 
Fillmore, and saying that the rest of the crew might go free. 
Fillmore remonstrated with Haskell against his surrender, and 
after some hesitation, it was decided that he should not be 
given up let the consequences be what they might. When 
the boat returned without him, Phillips was greatly incensed, 
and sent again with orders to bring Fillmore either dead or 
alive, but offering, if he would come voluntarily, to release 
him at the end of two months. Though placing httle confi- 
dence in the pirate's word, the thought of relieving the rest of 
the crew from danger, induced him to trust to future chances 
of escape, and he reluctantly consented to go. 

He was conscientious as well as stout-hearted, and immedi- 
ately resolved that no extremity of peril should induce him to- 
sign the piratical articles. Destruction seemed to stare him in 
the face, and he was full of apprehension, which only showed 



f^ BIOGEAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOEE. 

that the inexperienced young man did not understand human 
nature as well as his captors. They, ten in number, were all 
picked men — a set of the most daring and hardy looking fel- 
lows young Fillmore had ever set his eyes on. From White's 
description they had formed the opinion that he would make 
a worthy compeer in the bold qualities on which they prided 
themselves, and they wished to secure themselves against 
treachery by winning his voluntary consent to their wicked 
partnership. He was therefore agreeably surprised to find 
that they did not urge him very strenuously to sign their arti- 
cles, that they uttered no threats, and used arguments rather 
of a persuasive than of a compulsory nature. The captain 
renewed his promise to release him at the end of two months, 
and young Fillmore, assuming an appearance of satisfaction, 
engaged to serve him during that term to the best of his abil- 
ities. He was however placed at the helm, the most labori- 
ous post on the ship, and made to feel that his failure to sign 
the piratical agreement had increased the hardships of his 
condition. 

During the first two months no captures were made, except 
of some small vessels whose loading was too inconsiderable to 
tempt the cupidity of the pirates. 

When, at the expiration of his time, Fillmore reminded the 
captain of his promise to release him, he was told that little 
business had been done since he came aboard, and that he 
Gould not yet be spared. Phillips, however, promised, " on his 
honor," to set him free if he would serve faithfully three 
months longer. There was no alternative, and he was com- 
pelled to comply. 

During those three months there were no noteworthy occur- 
rences. A few small vessels were taken and plundered, but 
their cargoes were of little value, and their crews dismissed 
unharmed except two or three robust stout-looking men, whom 
Phillips selected and compelled to sign his articles. 



A DARING EXPLOIT. !io 

When Fillmore again demanded liis liberty, he was answered 
by such oaths and imprecations as only a pirate could use. 
Abandoning all hope of ever being liberated by the clemency 
of the captain, he made up his mind to endure his condition 
with as much fortitude as possible, and consoled himself with 
the hope that prisoners might some day be taken in concert 
with whom he could eflfect his release. From this time his 
sufferings and hardships were of the most aggravated charac- 
ter. One day, when bearing down on a merchant vessel, 
Phillips flew into a rage because Fillmore did not steer skill- 
fully, and swinging his broadsword around his head, cut 
eleven holes through his hat and the skin underneath. They 
chased the vessel during the whole day, and when, at night, 
they lost sight of her, the captain laid all the blame on Fill- 
more, and abused him accordingly. Our space does not allow 
us to give the details of his subsequent sufferings and his 
narrow escapes from death, an account of which has long been 
in print. After many trials, there were on board the pirate 
ship two individuals besides Fillmore who had not signed the 
piratical articles. Taking advantage of a drunken carousal by 
which the pirates celebrated a recent success, these three per- 
sons concerted a plan for destroying the pirates and getting 
possession of the ship. By burning the feet of some while 
they were dead drunk, so as to disable them, and despatching 
others, including the captain, with the ship carpenter's axes, 
they got the upper hand of the pirates, and with the aid of 
some prisoners on board, consisting of Frenchmen and negroes, 
they carried the vessel safely into Boston. Of the pirates who 
were brought in, two were executed in this country, and the 
rest sent to England with the forfeited vessel. Fillmore had 
been nine months on board the ship, and the Court of Admi- 
ralty, presided over by Lieutenant Governor Drummond, 
which tried and condemned the pirates, expressed its sense of 
the daring young man's valor by giving him " Captain Phillips* 



24: BIOaRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

gun, silver-hilted sword, silver shoe and knee buckles, a curious 
tobacco box, and two gold rings that the pirate Captain Phil- 
lips used to wear." White and Archer, two of the pirates, 
were executed June 2d, 1724, probably one or both of them 
in chains, as we find the bill of Robert Dobney, " smith," for 
" makeing of the chaines for John Rose Archer, one of the 
py rates, and the hire of a man to fix him on the Gebbet at 
Bird Island." 

The Ipswich town records show that John Fillmore was 
married, in the early part of the following winter, to Mary 
Spiller. He subsequently emigrated, with his wife, to Frank- 
lin, in Connecticut, then a part of Norwich, where a number 
of the inhabitants of Ipswich had purchased a large tract of 
land to which some of them removed. Here the great-grand- 
father of the ex-president, glad to abandon the sea, spent the 
remainder of his days in clearing the wilderness, and cultivat- 
ing a new farm. 

His son Nathaniel, while yet a youth, left the paternal roof 
to seek his fortune in the wilds of Vermont, and settled in 
Bennington, where he afterwards married, and reared a fam- 
ily of six children, all of whom, with one exception, are still 
living. That one died, a few years ago, at the age of eighty- 
one, and the average age of the five survivors, including the 
venerable father of the ex-president, who is eighty-five, is up- 
wards of eighty years. This remarkable longevity is a bless- 
ing inherited from progenitors whose constitutions were impaired 
by no vices, and rendered robust by temperate habits and 
manly toil. This Nathaniel Fillmore fought as a lieutenant 
under General Stark in the battle of Bennington. His son 
Nathaniel, the father of Millard, who was then a boy of six 
years, has a distinct recollection of the noise of the guns dur- 
ing the battle, having been at play, at the time, with other 
little boys whose fathers were likewise in the eno-agement. He 
says their mothers were assembled at the house of a neighbor, 



y BATTLE OF BENNINGTON. 25 

listening in anxiety and terror to the sound of the battle, 
and when the boys came trooping in, in excellent spirits, and 
were asked by one of these weeping wives if they were not 
afraid their fathers would be killed, they promptly answered, 
"No: they knew their fathers were more than a match for the 
regulars." After having fought in his country's defence, ' 
Nathaniel Fillmore continued to reside at Bennington, enjoying 
the independence he had helped purchase, till he ended his 
days in 1814. 

Nathaniel Fillmore, his son, who was born at Bennington, 
on the 19th of April, 117l, removed, in early life, into Western 
New York, which was then a wilderness, and settled in Cayuga 
county. He married Phebe Millard, daughter of Doctor Abi- 
ather Millard, of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, a woman of native 
intellect, grace, and refinement, which, in a more exalted social 
rank, would have attracted general homage. Mr. Fillmore is 
no exception to the rule that distinguished men have generally 
had superior mothers. Married at the early age of sixteen, 
she at once evinced all the jndgment of a mature and experi- 
enced woman in managing her domestic affairs, and counseling 
her husband in the difficulties of his hard pioneer life. Never 
was a mother more loved and venerated by her children, and 
though she has been a quarter of a century in her grave, her 
son, whose national reputation she did not live to witness, can 
not even now mention her without evident emotion. Not long 
after the birth of Millard, her husband lost his property by a 
bad title to the military lands he had purchased, and removed 
in 1802 to Sempronius, (now Niles,) in Cayuga county, where 
he resided till 1819, when he removed to Aurora, about 
eighteen miles from Buffalo, where he still resides, and where, 
until within the last few years, he cultivated a small farm with 
his own hands. 

We have been thus particular in tracing the history of Mr 
Fillmore's ancestors, because the party by which he has been 



26 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

nominated will feel a just pride in knowing that he is descended 
from a long line of virtuous, hardy, patriotic and purely Am- 
erican progenitors, whose character was formed by purely' 
American inj&uences. Including the son of the ex-president, 
the family can be traced on American soil for six generations, 
and, as has been said of that of Washington, its history gives 
proof ♦' of the lineal and enduring worth of the race." Though 
none of Mr. Fillmore's ancestors rose to wealth or high pubHc 
station, none of them fell below the standard of industrious and 
virtuous respectability, and when brought to the test, the fam- 
ily has always acquitted itself with courage, firmness, and 
honor. " Hereditary rank may be an illusion ; but hereditary 
VIRTUE gives a patent of innate nobleness beyond all the 
blazonry of the Herald's College."* 

Millard remained with his father till he was about fifteen 
years of age, During his early childhood he was a sickly and 
somewhat backward boy, but when his constitution began to 
acquire more vigor, he evinced that love of reading and eager 
appetite for knowledge by which a superior mind usually gives 
the first indications of its existence. The limited means of his 
father prevented his enjoying any advantages of education 
beyond the common schools of his neighborhood, which, from 
the newness of the country, were probably not of a very 
high order. He rapidly acquired all that his teachers had to 
impart, and devoured, in the intervals of farm labor, eVery 
stray book that fell in his way. This, assuredly, was not a 
superior education ; but it has been substantially the education 
of a great majority of American youth, since the first settle- 
ment of the country. Washington's early education was no 
better; Frankhn's not as good; and for a really robust mind, 
the kind of training it affords is not without its advantages. 
In such minds it fosters that strong intellectual thirst which 



* Irving's Life of Washington. 



EARL"? EDUCATION. 27 

is indispensable to the successful pursuit of knowledge, and 
without which all schools, and all the elaborate appliances of 
instruction, are idle and unavailing. The mind is not, as in 
tnany institutions of learning, set to studying subjects which 
are either above its capacity, or in which it feels no interest ; 
it never, therefore, becomes cloyed or discouraged; curiosity 
is never blunted ; and the keen mental hunger which results 
from scanty aliment, not only keeps the attention vigorously 
awake during the process of acquisition, but in the long inter- 
vals of labor, leads the mind back to the ground it has gone 
over, and cultivates that habit of reflecting on one's knowledge, 
without which it is of little use. It is a hard discipline, but 
many great minds have been formed by it; and no American 
youth, with the examples before him which the history of his 
country affords, need despair, if he has brains and resolution, 
of acquiring all the information requisite for eminent useful- 
ness. Not that colleges are either useless or unimportant; 
but they have nothing better to impart than a keen appetite 
for knowledge, energetic mental action, and confirmed habits 
of reflection. These are the keys of the temple of science, and 
whoever possesses them has nature's diploma, whether he has 
or has not been honored with a college parchment. 

At the age of fifteen, Millard was sent to learn the clothier's 
trade, a business which, as then conducted, furnished employ- 
ment during only a portion of the year. When he had 
remained four months with his master, he returned home to 
spend the winter, and earnestly remonstrated with his father 
against being sent back, assigning as a reason that he wished 
to learn the trade, but had been kept, a great part of the 
time, at" other employments. Thus early did he display one 
of the leading chai'acteristics to which he is indebted for his 
success in life — impatience of doing things by halves, or 
of pretending to do a thing and not doing it thoroughly. 
His father considered his request reasonable and granted it. 



28 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOKE. 

promising to find him another place. Mr. Fillmore had a near 
neighbor who was a clothier, but he declined to take Millard, 
because he had already as many apprentices as he could 
employ. The father, therefore, rode several days for the 
purpose of looking up a place, but without any success. 
Some time afterwards, one of his neighbor's apprentices was 
taken sick, and he applied for Millard's services for a few 
weeks till he should recover. Millard was permitted to go, 
and during those few weeks showed so much assiduity, and 
proved himself so capable, that his employer was unwilling to 
part with him, and applied to his father to have him remain 
as an apprentice. An arrangement was soon agreed upon, it 
being one of the stipulations that the boy should work for his 
master only when employed on the business he went to learn, 
and that the rest of the time his services should belong to his 
father. No indenture was drawn, each party considering the 
word of the other a sufficient guarantee for the fulfillment of 
the conditions. 

While learning his trade, young Fillmore taught school 
winters, and very soon becoming qualified for a teacher, he 
was employed in that capacity, and for several years occa- 
sionally eked out his scanty means by this laborious but useful 
occupation. As his faculties unfolded with increasing years, 
the youth began to feel a dawning consciousness that he was 
born for a higher destiny than carding wool and dressing 
cloth. At the age of nineteen, he attracted the favorable 
attention and made the acquaintance of the late Walter Wood^ 
Esq., of Cayuga county, who discovered, beneath the rude 
exterior of the clothier's apprentice, indications of superior 
talent, which he urged him to cultivate. By the assistance 
of this estimable gentleman, he was enabled, with the consent 
of his father, to buy his time and devote himself to study. 
He was received into the office of Judge Wood, who had a 
large law library, though he did but little professional business, 



LAW STUDIES. 29 

being principally occupied in the management of a large 
estate. Here young Fillmore read law and general literature, 
and, like Washington at the same age, he found employment 
as a surveyor on the new lands of his patron. By the occa- 
sional practice of surveying, and teaching school a part of the 
year, he avoided incurring a larger debt to his benefactor than 
he was able afterwards easily to pay. 

In the fall of 1821, Mr. Fillmore removed to Erie county, 
, and the next spring entered a law office in Buffalo, maintain- 
ing himself by teaching school while pursuing his legal studies. 
After a year passed in this laborious manner, he was admitted 
to the Court of Common Pleas, in the spring of 1823. He 
immediately removed to the village of Aurora, where he 
opened an office, and devoted himself to the practice of his 
profession. 

Such was the early life of a man who was subsequently 
honored with responsible civil trusts, rose to fill the highest 
office of the country in a great and memorable crisis, and now 
ranks among the most eminent statesmen of his time. His 
youth was marked by prudence, energy, perseverance, and 
good sense, and gave evidence of talent ; but though it showed 
the promptings of a moderate and reasonable ambition, it 
afiorded no indications from which even a sagacious observer 
could have predicted Mr. Fillmore's present eminence. He 
was like one of those sites in the vast and then uncultivated 
West, which have since risen to be great cities and important 
marts of trade. When Millard Fillmore was a boy in the 
backwoods, land in Buffalo or Chicago would have brought 
no higher price in the market than millions of acres of the 
surrounding country. The men who first got a glimpse of its 
capabilides, and laid out village lots, showed by the prices at 
which they sold them, that they had no suspicion of the im- 
mense fortune which was passing out of their hands. Who 
was there, at that early day, that could have picked out the 



so BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

particular acres whose value would be a thousand fold of thai 
of the average acres of the boundless West ? Or who, from 
the great mass of humble and laborious American youth, could 
have then selected the particular one that should win the 
highest honors of the Republic ? Who would have suspected 
he was that unassuming young man who has just gone to a 
country village to establish himself as a lawyer ? But the 
homespun garb of that young man covers talents which will 
cause us to hear from him again in a wider theater. 



ELECTION TO THE LEGISLATURE. 31 



CHAPTER 11. 

MR. Fillmore's entrance into public life. 

Mr. Fillmore continued to reside at Aurora until the spring 
of 1830. During these seven years, his professional practice, 
(as would be inferred from his location, in a purely agricultural 
district,) was not large; but all the cases in which he was em- 
ployed were managed with so much ability that his reputation 
as a lawyer continued steadily to rise, until it attracted the 
favorable attention of his professional brethren in Buffalo, 
whither he was induced to remove by the offer of a highly 
advantageous connection with an older member of the bar. 

Durino' his residence in Aurora, Mr. Fillmore was married, 
in 1826, to Abagail, daughter of Rev. Lemuel Powers, a lady 
of great moral worth, of modest and unobtrusive deportment, 
and remarkable intelligence and good sense. She was of 
Massachusetts descent, being of the stock of the Lelands, and 
one of the 9,624 descendants of Henry Leland, of Sherburne, 
one of the early settlers of the country. In the Leland family 
magazine, published in 1850, the names of all its members 
are recorded, and among other well executed engravings, it 
contains a likeness of Mrs. Fillmore, accompanied by a brief 
sketch of her life. 

Mr. Fillmore's first appearance in public life was during his 
residence in Aurora. In the fall of 1828 he had become so 
favorably known to the citizens of Erie county, that he was 
elected as their representative in the State Legislature, and 
took liis seat in that body the January following. In the 



32 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

"Political History of New York," written by Judge Hammond, 
before Mr. Fillmore had become much known in national 
politics, we find the following mention of his entrance into 
public life: "Several of the western counties were represented 
by anti-masons ; and among the most prominent of them were 
Millard. Fillmore, from Erie; Philo C. Fuller, of Livingston 
and Robert C. Nicholas, of Ontario." 

The fact that Mr. Fillmore commenced his public life as a 
prominent member of the anti-masonic party, which had then 
just arisen in Western New York, renders it proper that we 
should make a few observations on the character of that party. 
Mr. Fillmore's prominent position in it was the natural con- 
sequence of liis superior talents; the fact that he belonged to 
it, may require a different explanation. 

Had it not' been for recent local occurrences of remarkable 
atrocity, which, from the mystery in which they were shrouded, 
inflamed public curiosity in proportion as they baffled the 
efibrts of justice, and which kept the whole community in a 
furor of excitement that has hardly a parallel in history, 
Mr. Fillmore would have regarded the masonic order, as all 
just minds had previously regarded it, and as all just minds 
now regard it, as a perfectly innocent and harmless institu- 
tion ; in fact, merely a charitable and social club, designed for 
the promotion of good feehng among its members, and the 
relief of their indigent brethren. It is an ancient institution, 
made respectable by the many eminent men who have be- 
longed to it ; and, by the secrecy of its proceedings, appealing 
strongly to a principle of human nature, which has displayed 
its activity in every age of the world. The celebrated Eleu- 
sinian and other mysteries of the Greeks and Romans; the 
Esoteric doctrines of the ancient philosophers; the sect of 
Essenes among the Jews; the Templars of the middle ages; 
the order of Odd Fellows in our own times, and the secret 
societies in our colleges, are illustrations of how congenial it is 



• ANTI-MASONRY. 33 

to the human mind to participate in proceedings from all 
knowledge of which curious outsiders are excluded. Provi- 
ded the objects of such societies are innocent and praiseworthy, 
their secrecy is no more deserving of censure than is that 
honorable confidence by the violation of which one would 
forfeit his claim to the character of a gentleman. The 
secresy of the Free Masons was, therefore, in itself, no valid 
ground of objection to their fraternity, and nothing could well 
have been more frivolous than the formation of a party merely 
to oppose this feature of the masonic institution. 

The idea that the anti-masonic party was formed for this 
purpose, is a misconception which does great injustice to the 
many able and respectable men who were members of it. 
The fundamental principle of the anti-masonic party was the 
SUPREMACY OF THE LAWS. Facts of a most extraordinary 
nature, which had forced themselves on public attention, led 
to the conclusion that the existence of masonry was incon- 
sistent with the regular administration of justice. This conclu- 
sion was, no doubt, founded on too narrow a basis of facts. It 
was very much like the rejection of Christianity by a resident 
of a Catholic country, who judges of the religion by the only 
instances of which he has any knowledge, namely, those 
which fall under his own observation. The fact that Wash- 
ington, and indeed most of the distinguished public men of 
the country, had been members of the masonic order, ought 
to have been regarded as a proof that masonry, as they under- 
stood it, required nothing inconsistent with their obligations to 
their country, or which conflicted with the unlimited suprem- 
acy of the laws. But the same principle of human nature 
which causes us to be more deeply impressed by the fall of a 
building on the opposite side of the street, which kills half a 
dozen men, than we should be by hearing that an earthquake 
in China had engulphed a city of two millions of inhabitants, 
will invariably color men's views of any particular institution 



iSjt BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOEE. 

in accordance with the specimens with which they are most 
intimately conversant. 

The best apology for the anti-masons is to be found in the 
facts in which the party had its origin. A simple relation of 
these will be a sufficient justification for the opposition to ma- 
sonry with which Mr. Fillmore was identified, on his first 
entrance into public life. Occurrences which so powerfully 
aroused public indignation as to create a political party that 
extended over a great part of the country, and embraced a 
full proportion of able and experienced men, and whose nomi- 
nation for the presidency was accepted by a man of the char- 
acter and eminence of William Wirt — occurrences which led 
to these important results, could hardly have done otherwise 
than make a deep impression on a young man of twenty-six, 
residing in the section of country which was the scene of the 
outrage. Had he been indiflferent amid the deep excitement 
of the whole community around him, it would have argued a 
stoical apathy and callousness of feeling, not only discreditable 
to the heart of a young man, but implying, in a person of any 
age, a lack of human sympathy, and of that quick resentment 
of injustice which is one of the best attributes of manhood. 

At Batavia, a beautiful village in Western New York, which 
had become a place of importance when Buffalo was a mere 
cluster of rude dwellings, there resided, in 1826, a printer, 
named William Morgan. His business was not thriving, and 
being a royal arch mason, he hit upon the expedient of 
replenishing his pockets by divulging the secrets of his order. 
A rumor soon became current that Morgan was preparing a 
book on masonry, and attracted the attention of several of the 
masonic lodges of Western New York. On the 11th of Sep- 
tember, the master of a masonic lodge at Canandaigua, a 
town some fifty miles distant, procured a warrant to arrest 
Morgan on the charge of stealing a shirt and cravat, and, with 
two or three other masons, proceeded to Batavia, where they 



ABDUCTION OF MORGAN. 35 

caused him to be arrested, hurried £im into a carriage, con- 
veyed him to Canandaigua, and brought him before the justice 
of the peace who had issued the warrant. He was imme- 
diately discharged, there being no evidence that he was guilty 
of the larceny complained of, but immediately re-arrested on 
a small debt, which had been assigned to the same master- 
mason who had procured the first warrant. Judgment was 
rendered against Morgan for two dollars, an execution instantly 
issued, and he was committed to close confinement in the 
Canandaigua jail. Here he remained but a few hours. He 
was discharged at a late hour of the same evening, and imme- 
diately after leaving the prison doors, he was seized, gagged, 
and put into a covered carriage, which was driven two days 
without interruption, until, on the evening of the 14th of Sep- 
tember, it reached the Niagara river. This was accomplished 
by relays of horses and the agency of many different individ- 
uals ; and Morgan was confined in the magazine of Fort Niag- 
ara, at the mouth of the river. This bold and unprecedented 
outrage had been so skillfully planned, and was executed with 
so much address and caution, that it was for a long time 
impossible to penetrate the secrecy in which the conspirators 
had veiled their movements. 

. The rumor which had been for some time current in Batavia 
of Morgan's intention to publish a book revealing the secrets 
of masonry, seemed to afford a clue to the motives of this great 
outrage. It was known that he had been remonstrated with 
by his brother masons, and that all their efforts to induce him 
to suppress his book had produced no impression on him. A 
public meeting was held, and a committee appointed, who 
proceeded to Canandaigua to investigate the circumstances of 
Morgan's disappearance. All they were able to ascertain was. 
that Morgan had been seized immediately on his release from 
prison, hurried into a carriage, and driven off by night, in the 
direction of Rochester. When the result of this investigation 



36 BIOGEAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOEE. 

became known it created intense public excitement. A great 
crime, the result of an extensive and deep-laid conspiracy, had 
been committed. A citizen had disappeared under circum- 
stances which justified the suspicion that the hands which 
conveyed him away had been stained with his blood. Public 
meetings were held in a great many towns, particularly those 
through which the circumstances attending the conspiracy 
indicated that Morgan had been carried, and committees were 
appomted to investigate the facts. These meetings had no 
political purpose, nor any other object than to ferret out an 
unexampled crime, which was so shrouded in mystery that it 
inflamed curiosity not less than it aroused 4'esentment. They 
were composed indiscriminately of men of both political parties, 
and no motive was avowed but the praiseworthy one of inves- 
tigating a crime committed against the liberty, if not the life, 
of an American citizen. Even the masons were appealed to, 
to assist in these investigations, and told that if they wished to 
wipe out a blot from their escutcheon, and protect themselves 
from suspicion, they should lend their aid in vindicating the 
violated majesty of the laws. 

These committees of investigation encountered unexpected 
obstacles, and a long time elapsed before they were able to 
trace the course of the conspirators to Fort Niagara. At first, 
the crime was supposed to be the work of a few misguided 
persons, acting without the sanction of the fraternity ; although 
there were some, who, from the beginning, held the whole 
order responsible. As the investigations proceeded, the num- 
ber of these increased, until it finally embraced a large portion 
of the community. It was observed that, with scarcely an 
exception, no mason rendered any assistance in the investiga- 
tion. It was discovered that every person implicated in the 
foul transaction was a mason. Masons attempted to cover the 
whole investigation with ridicule, affected to disbeheve that 
any crime had been committed, and some even went so far as 



ABDUCTION OF MORGAN. 37 

to say, that if Morgan had been made away with, the trans- 
action was perfectly justifiable. They taunted the committees 
with their inability to accomplish anything, when judges, 
jurors and sheriffs were masons ; witnesses were mysteriously 
spirited away ; the comniittees vilified and abused ; and in the 
exasperation which followed, the conviction became general 
amono- those who were not masons, that the institution was 
responsible for the crime which thus eluded public justice. 

The precise fate of Morgan, after his confinement in Fort 
Niagara, never became known. But at this day there remains 
no doubt that he was murdered in cold blood, by members 
of the masonic fraternity, to prevent the disclosure of their 
secrets. It is not probable that, at the beginning, they con- 
templated the commission of so foul a crime ; but when they 
had once abducted their victim, they knew no other way to 
dispose of him. A second crime became necessary for the 
purpose of concealing the first. 

The pubhcation of Morgan's book, which was not prevented 
by his abduction, made known the obligations taken by masons 
in joining the order. Considering the circumstances under 
which they were brought to light, it is no wonder that these 
oaths received a literal interpretation. They were probably 
regarded by most of those who took them, as a mere form, 
without meaning, for it was esLabUshed by the testimony, 
both of adhering and seceding masons, that in one of them 
(called the royal arch) the candidate swears that he will assist 
a brother mason in distress, and espouse his cause, so far as to 
extricate him from the same, if in his power, whether he be right 
or wrong; that he will conceal the secrets of a brother, given 
him in charge as such, murder and treason not excepted; and in 
other oaths the candidate binds himself to avenge the violated 
secrets of the lodge, by the infliction of death on the offender^ 
and to revenge the wrongs of a brother to the utmost 
extremity. 



38 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

These oaths being made public immediately after the com- 
mission of a great crime,, by the agency of masons, and in the 
face of their attempt to screen the perpetrators from justice, 
nothing was more natural tban that the community in which 
it had been committed should suppose that the oaths were 
not mere unmeaning forms, but obligations assumed in good 
faith, and to be strictly interpreted. " If this be masonry," 
said an outraged community, *' it is the duty of good men to 
unite and put it down." Had the masons of Western New 
York co-operated in the efiPorts to bring the conspirators to 
justice, the nature of their institution would not have been 
so misconceived. 

When, in January, 1827, Lawson and others were brought 
to trial, the public expected developments which would clear 
up the mystery. But, by a piece of adroit management, the 
facts which the public curiosity so eagerly craved, were still 
kept shrouded from view. Contrary to expectation, the de ■ 
fendants pleaded guilty, and thus excluded all testimony. 
The community was raised to a still higher pitch of excite- 
ment. Judge Throop, in sentencing the prisoners, addressed 
them in the following language. " Your conduct has created, 
in the people of this section of the country, a strong feeling 
of virtuous indignation. The court rejoices to witness it — to 
be made certain that a citizen's person can not be invaded by 
lawless violence, without its being felt by every individual in 
the community. It is a blessed spirit, and we do hope that it 
will not subside ; that it will be accompanied by a ceaseless 
vigilance and untiring activity, until every actor in this profli- 
gate conspiracy is hunted from his hiding-place, and brought 
before the tribunals of his country, to receive the punishment 
merited by his crime. We think we see in this public sensa- 
tion, the spirit which brought us into existence as a nation, 
and a pledge that our rights and liberties are destined to 
endure." 



ABOLITION OF IMPRISONMENT FOR DEBT. 39 

Up to this time, the excitement had not taken a political 
turn. Baffled in their attempts to ascertain the facts, it is not 
surprising that the community indulged in dark suspicions, nor 
that horrible rumors got afloat, and were received with im- 
plicit credence. The public mind was lashed into a state 
bordering on fury. Under any other government than ours, 
there would have been serious outbreaks, ending in violence 
and bloodshed. But, in accordance with the genius of our 
institutions, a political direction was given to the excitement, 
and it was aimed to bring the elective franchise to aid the 
tribunals of justice, which were set at defiance. 

From this account of the origin of anti-masonry, it will be 
seen that it was not, as is generally supposed, founded on a 
blind and indiscriminate opposition to secret societies, but 
aimed at the less frivolous, and entirely commendable object 
of sustaining the supremacy of the laws. That it mistook the 
character of the institution it opposed, was an unavoidable 
consequence of the extraordinary facts by which a previously 
indifferent community were startled into an active, but con- 
stantly baffled attempt to investigate the subject. In personal 
character and influence, the anti-masonic party was one of the 
most respectable that has ever appeared in our politics. 

Durino' the three years that Mr. Fillmore was a member of 
the New York Legislature, it was a body of great ability, em- 
bracing some of the most distinguished men that have ever 
figured in New York politics. As the Democratic party was 
largely in 'the majority, and under the discipline of experienced 
leaders, a young -member of the opposition, naturally modest 
and unassuming, had little opportunity to distinguish himself. 

Mr. Fillmore, however, made a favorable impression from 
the very first ; and in all measures not of a party character, 
his opinion soon came to be regarded as of great weight. He 
made no attempts to show off his abilities ; he never spoke for 
display ; but the clearness with whicl\ his views were formed, 



4:0 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMORE, 

the modest brevity with which he explained them, the candor, 
discretion and good sense which he uniformly evinced, gained 
for him a strong hold on the confidence of his associates. One 
of the measures in which he felt great interest was the aboli- 
tion of imprisonment for debt. The bill, as it stands on the 
statute book, was drafted by him and the late Hon. John C. 
Spencer, and to their zealous advocacy it was principally in- 
debted for success. The impression which Mr. Fillmore — a 
young man without experience, and barely twenty-nine years 
of ao-e — made during the first session he served in the Legis- 
lature, may be judged of by the manner his return to that 
body the next year is mentioned by Judge Hammond. He 
says : " The anti-masonic party had not increased their num- 
bers in the Assembly, but they had greatly added to the 
talents of that branch of the Legislature. Mr. Granger, Mr, 
Fillmore, Mr. Nicholas, and Mr. P. C. Fuller were again re- 
turned. To these strong and powerful representatives in the 
Assembly, they this year added Thurlow Weed, of Monroe, 
and Abner Hazeltine, of Chautauque county." * Speaking in 
another place of the anti-masonic members of the Legislature, 
he mentions the names of several, including Mr. Fillmore, and 
says, they "were all men whose talents would have done 
credit to any deliberative body ; and the address and eloquence 
,of some of them would have added luster to any legislative 
assembly in the world." 

It can not but be regarded as creditable to the talents of an 
inexperienced young man from the new settlements of West- 
ern New York, that, notwithstanding the native modesty of 
his character, he immediately took rank with the ablest mem- 
bers of the body. Lest it should be thought that these views 
of his early public career are colored by a knowledge of his 
subsequent success, we insert the following description written 



* Political History of New York. 



A LEGISLATIVE PORTRAIT. 41 

at the time. It is one of a series of " Legislative Portraits," 
which appeared in the Albany Evening Journal, during the 
session of 1830. They were written by an experienced ob- 
server, and included only prominent members of the Legis- 
lature : 

" No. VL — Millard Fillmoue, of Erie county, is of the 
middle stature — five feet nine inches in height. He appears to 
be about thirty-five years of age, but it is said he is not more 
than thirty, of light complexion, regular features, and of a 
mild and benign countenance. 

" His ancestors were among the hardy sons of the North, 
and, during the war of the Revolution, were Whigs, inhabiting 
the Green Mountains of Vermont. Mr. Fillmore, from the 
commencement of his political career, has been a republican. 
He is, in the strictest sense of the term, a self-made man. 
He was educated and reared in the western district of our 
State. At an early period of Hfe he went to the fulling busi- 
ness; but naturally of an inquiring mind, and anxious to in- 
crease his limited stock of knowledge, his leisure hours were 
occupied in reading. When about twenty years of age, he 
retired from his former pursuits, and after having studied the 
law as a profession, he was licensed to practice. He was a 
member of the last Legislature. 

" Although the age of Mr. Fillmore does not exceed thirty 
years, he has all the prudence, discretion, and judgment of an 
experienced man. He is modest, retiring, and unassuming. 
He appears to be perfectly insensible of the rare and happy 
qualities of mind for which he is so distinguished. He ex- 
hibits, on every occasion, when called into action, a mildness 
and benignity of temper, mingled with a firmness of purpose, 
that is seldom concentrated in the same individual. His in- 
tercourse mih. the bustling world is very limited. His books, 
and occasionally the rational conversation of intelligent friends, 
seem to constitute his happiness. He is never to be found in 



43 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

the giddy mazes of fashionable hfe. And yet there is in his 
manner an indescribable something which creates a strong im- 
pression in his favor, and which seems to characterize him as 
a well bred gentleman. 

"He possesses a logical mind; and there is not a member 
of the house- who presents his views, on any subject that he 
attempts to discuss, in a more precise and luminous manner. 
He seldom speaks unless there appears to be ,an absolute ne- 
cessity for the arguments or explanations which he offers. 
Nor does he ever rise without attracting the attention of all 
who are within the sound of his voice — a tribute of respect 
paid to his youthful modesty and great good sense. 

*' As a legislator, Mr. Fillmore appears to act with perfect 
fairness and impartiality. He examines every subject dis- 
tinctly, for himself, and decides on its merits according to the 
best lights of his own judgment or understanding. He is now 
at an age when his character is to be irrevocably fixed. As a 
politician, he is not formed to be great. He has none of the 
qualities requisite for a political chieftain. He wants that self- 
confidence and assurance (if the term may be allowed,) with- 
out which a partisan leader can never hope for followers. Mr. 
Fillmore's love of books and habits of thinking, will, ulti- 
mately, conduct him to a more tranquil, but higher destiny, if 
the one is not broken upon, and the other diverted from its 
natural course, to the too often polluted, and always turbulent, 
if not mortifying conflicts of foction. If he has not sufficient 
moral firmness to resist the allurements which ■ legislation pre- 
sents to the young and ambitious, then ought his friends to 
act for him, and refuse him a re-nomination. It is a life which 
not only casts to the winds of heaven all employment as a 
professional man, but it uproots, sooner or later, the germs of 
industr}^ and the delights of study. These are *the admoni- 
tions of age and experience. 

"As a debater, Mr. Fillmore occupies a very elevated stand 



MR. Fillmore's modesty. 43 

in the house. His manner is good; his voice agreeable. To- 
ward his opponents he never fails to evince a most studied 
delicacy. He is mild and persuasiv^e, sometimes animated. 
His speeches are pithy and sententious ; always free from idle 
and vapid declamation. His arguments are logically arranged, 
and presented to the house without embarrassment or con- 
fusion." 

The advice which this writer tendered to Mr. Fillmore, to 
retire from public life, was doubtless meant for his private 
advantage, rather than that of the country. There can be no 
doubt of the sojmdness of the general principle, that when a 
young lawyer allows himself to be allured into politics, he 
sacrifices his prospects of professional eminence. But in Mr. 
Fillmore's case, the very love of study which is assigned as a 
reason for retirement, has ensured a hearty devotion to quiet 
pursuits whenever he has been released from the calls of pub- 
lic duty. The lack of the self-confidence and assurance deemed 
essential to a great party leader, has not interfered, as was 
predicted, with Mr. Fillmore's poHtical success, but, on the 
contrar3% has inspired additional public confidence, from the 
conviction that he is not governed by self-seeking ambition. 
May the day be far distant when the American people shall 
prefer bold assurance to modest merit! Washington possessed 
as little of the self-confident and assuming qualities which are 
considered essential in party leaders, as did Mr. Fillmore ; but 
in both cases the American people have had the good sense 
tQ recognize their merits. 



44 BIOGKAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOEE. 



CHAPTER HI. 

MR. Fillmore's career in congress. 

Mr. Fillmore's term of service in the New York Legislature 
expired in 1831. In the fall of 1832 he was elected by his 
district as its representative in Congress. During the first 
sessions in which he served, the national bank was the en- 
grossing political topic. General Jackson's celebrated veto and 
his removal of the deposits had created great public excitement; 
but Mr. Fillmore did not, as will afterwards appear, attach 
that extreme importance to a national bank which was attrib- 
uted to it by his party. He would not, therefore, have made 
a figure in the stirring debates of the' period, even if he had 
been less inexperienced and unassuming. More anxious to 
discharge his duty faithfully than to make a display of his 
abilities, he served in the twenty-third Congress, with credit, 
indeed, but without any very marked distinction. At the 
close of his term, he devoted himself, with the assiduity which 
forms a part of his character, to the labors of his profession, in 
which he had risen to a high rank and enjoyed a lucrative 
practice. His fellow citizens, however, had too just an appre- 
ciation of his capacity for public usefulness to allow him to 
remain long in retirement, and they elected him to the twenty- 
fifth, the twenty-sixth, and the twenty-seventh Congress, hon- 
oring him at the last election with the largest majority ever 
given in his district. His congressional career was terminated 
by a letter to his constituents declining to serve them longer 
in that capacity. 



CONGRESSIONAL LABORS. 45 

Up to the time of his last re-election, the party with which 
Mr. Fillmore acted was in a minority in the national councils, 
and, as a necessary consequence, he was not assigned any 
position in the organization of the House corresponding to his 
;eminent capacity. But when, after the great political revolu- 
tion of 1840, by which the Whig party came into power, a 
Congress met to devise remedies for the financial distresses 
which had overthrown the preceding administration, Mr. Fill- 
more at once rose to his proper level, as a man fitted for 
responsible leadership in great and trying emergencies. The 
committee of ways and means, always the most important in 
the House, became invested with unusual consequence at a 
period when the chief duty of Congress was to introduce a 
new revenue system which should relieve the country from 
the embarrassments under which it was suffering. That Mr. 
Fillmore was immediately made chairman of that committee, 
on the accession of his party to power, not only proves their 
sense of his capacity, but shows that during preceding sessions, 
when acting with a minority, he must have discharged his 
duties with singular ability and judgment. Confidence so 
complete could not have been lightly or hastily won. 

Before describing the manner in which Mr. Fillmore ac- 
quitted himself in this responsible position, it may be expected 
that we should give some account of his previous congressional 
labors. An examination of the proceedings of Congress shows 
an active participation, on the part of Mr. Fillmore, in the 
business of the House. " He laboriously investigated all the 
subjects which came before it, and frequently bore a part in 
its debates. When he spoke, however, it was not to win 
the applause of the galleries, but to advance the business of 
the House. Confining himself to the matter in hand, he was 
always clear and forcible, but never aimed at a reputation for 
any other species of eloquence than that which consists in 
speaking to the point, and producing conviction. The interests 



46 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

of his immediate constituents were very thoroughly attended 
to and ably advocated, and, from their importance, demanded 
a large amount of attention. On account of the local position 
of Buffalo, that city has a great stake in all that affects the 
safe navigation of the great lakes and western waters — a large 
commercial interest centering there which requires the protec- 
tion of the national government. As- was to have been ex- 
pected, Mr. Fillmore gave his earnest and persevering support 
to the internal improvement pohcy then advocated by the Whig 
party. Of the other leading measures of that party, one had 
been temporarily settled by Mr. Clay's compromise tariff of 
1833. On the other — the United States Bank — Mr. Fill- 
more did not fully sympathize with the views of his party, and 
the public opinion of the country has since settled into the 
conviction that such an institution is not demanded by the 
public welfare. On the 25th of September, 1837, Mr. Fillmore 
delivered a speech against the bill to postpone the fourth in- 
stalment under the deposit act of 1836. The purport of the 
speech having been erroneously reported in the Globe, he 
addressed to the publishers the following note : 

" House of Representatives, ") 
September 27th, 1837. j 

" Gentlemen : My attention has been this moment drawn to 
a remark in the Globe of last evening, purporting to give the 
proceedings of the House on Monday evening, in which I find 
the following statement: 

" ' Mr. Fillmore resumed and continued his remarks on the 
subject, with the addition of a lengthy argument in favor of a 
Bank of the United States.' " 

" Passing over some evident misapprehensions of your re- 
porter as to the purport of my remarks generally, I wish to 
say that he is entirely and most singularly mistaken in saying 
that I made a lengthy argument in favor of a United States 
Bank. I made no argument in favor of the United States 
Bank, nor of a United States Bank ; but, on the contrary, 
expressly dischiimed ever having been the particular friend of 



UNITED STATES BANK. 4:T 

the United States Bank, and expressed my sincere doubts 
whether the incorporation of a new United States Bank, at 
this time, would relieve the present embarrassments of the 
community. -Will you do me the justice to correct the mis- 
take ? Respectfully yours, 

"Millard Fillmore. 
" Messrs. Blair and Rives." 

We have made this quotation to show that Mr. Fillmore's 
views were in advance of those of his party on a question 
respecting which there has now ceased to be any ditference 
of opinion. 

A subject which gave rise to much warm discussion in the 
twenty-fifth Congress, and created great excitement in various 
parts of the country, was the refusal to receive the abolition 
petitions which were poured in great numbers into both Houses. 
Mr. Fillmore, like Mr. Clay^ was in favor of the reception of 
such petitions and having them referred to an appropriate 
committee and reported on. Mr. Fillmore supported this 
policy only by his votes, but Mr. Clay spoke warmly and 
strongly in its fjivor, urging reasons of great weight and force. 
To say nothing of its injustice, there can be no doubt that the 
refusal to receive such petitions was an insane and short-sighted 
policy, and one-*of the chief agencies in flmning the flame of 
sectional excitement and confirming sectional prejudices. While 
very few in any part of the country were in favor of abolishing 
slavery in the District of Columbia, large masses of the people 
regarded the right of petition as sacred and inestimable, and 
the abolitionists found themselves reinforced by multitudes 
who disapproved of their leading purpose, but were willing to 
unite with them in the assertion of what they regarded as an 
inviolable right. Had the petitions been referred, no commit- 
tee would h*ve reported in favor of granting their prayer, and 
the only consequence would have been a more public state- 
ment of *he reasons why the abolition of slavery in the District 



48 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

of Columbia was both inexpedient in itself, and inconsistent 
with implied obligations to the States of Maryland and Virginia. 
Mr. Clay's views (in which Mr. Fillmore sympathized) as to 
the proper manner of treating such petitions, are sufficiently 
indicated in the following extract from the proceedings of the 
Senate. A petition had been presented, signed by a large 
number of ladies in the State of New Jersey, praying for the 
immediate abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia. A 
motion was made to lay the petition on the table : 

" Mr. Hubbard moved to lay that motion on the table. 

'* Mr. Morris asked for the yeas and nays. 

" Mr. Clay wished the motion withdrawn for a moment. 
It was manifest that the subject of slavery in the District of 
Columbia was extending itself in the public mind, and daily 
engaging more and more of the public attention. His opin- 
ions, as expressed in the Legislature of the country, were, lie 
believed, perfectly well known. He had no hesitation in say- 
ing that Congress ought not to do what was asked by the 
petitioners without the consent of the people of the District 
of Columbia. He was desirous of inquiring of the Senator 
from New Jersey, or any other conversant with the subject, 
whether the feeling of abolition in the abstract was extending 
itself in their respective States, or whether it was not be- 
coming mixed up with other matters — such, for instance, in 
the belief that the sacred right of petition had been assailed. 
It became the duty of the Senate to inquire into this business, 
and understand the subject well. 

" There were many, no doubt, of these petitioners, who did 
not mean to assert that slavery should be abolished, that were 
contending for what they understood to be a great constitu- 
tional right. Would it not, then, under this view of the sub- 
ject, be the best course to allay excitement, and endeavor to 
calm down and tranquilize the public mind ? Would it not be 
wiser to refer the subject to the Committee for the District 
of Columbia, or some other committee, that would elicit oU 
the facts, reason coolly and dispassionately, pr.esenting the 
subject in all its bearings to the citizens of non-slaveholding 
States, and in a manner worthy of the great subject ? Would 



ABOLITION TETITIONS. 49 

V 
not such a proceeding be well calculated to insure harmony 
and amity in all parts of the Union? On this subject there 
was, he was a\fare, a great diversity of opinion, and he rose 
merely for the purpose of making these suggestions to the 
Senate." 

Mr. Fillmore's supporting the right of petition merely by 
his vote, did not satisfy the abolitionists of his district, and left 
them in doubt as to the precise character of his views. When, 
therefore, in 1838, he was a candidate for re-election, they ad- 
dressed him a letter of inquiry, to which he made the follow- 
ing reply: 

"Buffalo, October 17tli, 1838. 

"Sir: — Your communication of the 15th inst, as chairman 
of a committee appointed by ^Tke Anti- Slavery Society of 
the County of Erie^ has just come to hand. You solicit my 
answer to the following interrogatories : 

"'1st. Do you believe that petitions to Congress on the 
subject of slavery and the slave trade, ought to be received, 
read, and respectfully considered by the representatives of the 
people?' 

" ' 2d. Are you opposed to the annexation of Texas to this 
Union under any circumstances, so long as slaves are held 
therein?' 

" ' 3d. Are you in favor of Congress exercising all the con- 
stitutional power it possesses, to abolish the internal slave trade 
between the States?' 

" * Are you in favor of immediate legislation for the abolition 
of slavery in the District of Columbia ? ' 

" I am much engaged, and have no time to enter into an 
argument or to explain at length my reasons for my opinion. 
I shall, therefore, content myself for the present, by answering 
all your interrogatories in the affirmative, and leave for some 
future occasion a more extended discussion of the subject. I 
would, however, take* this occasion to say, that in thus frankly 
giving my opinion, I would not desire to have it understood in 
the nature of a pledge. At the same time that I seek no dis- 
guises, but freely give my sentiments on any subject of in- 
terest to those for whose suffrages I am a candidate, I am 
3 



'1^0 BIOGKAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

opposed to giving any pledges that sliall deprive me hereafter 
of all discretionary power. My own character must be the 
guaranty for the general correctness of my legislative deport- 
ment On every important subject I am bound to deliberate 
before I act, and especially as a legislator, to possess myself 
of all the imformation, and listen to every argument that can 
be adduced by my associates, before I give a final vote. If i 
stand pledged to a particular course of action, 1 cease to be a 
responsible agent, but 1 become a mere machine. Should 
subsequent events show beyond all doubt that the course I 
had become pledged to pursue was ruinous to my constituents 
and discrraceful to myself, I have no alternative, no opportunity 
for repe^ntance, and there is no power to absolve me from my 
obligation. Hence the impropriety, not to say absurdity, m 
my "v'iews, of giving a pledge. 

« 1 am aware that you have not asked any pledge, and I 
beheve I know your sound judgment and good sense too well 
to think you desire any such thing. It was, however, to pre- 
vent any misrepresentation on the part of others, that i have 
felt it my duty to say thus much on this subject. 
" 1 am, respectfully, 

'* Your most ob't servant, 

"Millard Fillmore. 

"W. Mills, Esq., Chairman, &c." 

This manly refusal to bind himself by any pledges, as to his 
future course as a legislator, doe§ honor to the independence 
of his character. Mr. Fillmore was in favor of the right of 
petidon, and all his natural sympathies were opposed to hu- 
man slavery; but he was aware that the relations of the 
national government to that institution are not to be deter- 
mined by the sympathies of the human heart. His letter 
implies that the subject demanded inquiry, thought, and 
deliberation; and he firmly asserts his right, when called to 
investigate it in a legislative capacity, to be governed by such 
views as mature investigation should lead him to adopt. 

Another subject which was brought to the attention of the 
twenty-fifth Congress, deserves mention for the leading part 



THE STEAMER CAROLINE. 51 

which Mr. Fillmore took in the proceedings, and the illustra- 
tion they afiford of his prompt and ardent patriotism. 

In 1837, during the insurrection in Canada, known as "the 
Patriot War," a steamer called the Carohne, and owned by a 
Mr. Wells, of Butfalo, was employed on the Niagara river in 
the transportation of freight and passengers. On the mof ning 
of the 29th of December, the Caroline left Buffalo, and pro- 
ceeded down the river, running near the shore on the Ameri- 
can side, within the territorial limits of the United States. 
She touched at Black Rock, and ran up the American flag, 
but had hardly left the harbor of that village when a volley 
of musketry was discharged at her from the Canada shore. 
No injury was done, however, and the Caroline continued her 
course down the river, without further molestation. On 
reaching Navy Island, she landed her passengers and freight, 
and in the course of the afternoon made two or three trips 
between Navy Island and Schlosser, on the. American side. 
At six o'clock in the evening, she was made fast with chains 
to the dock at Schlosser, and besides the crew, consisting of 
ten men, twenty-three other persons, who were unable to pro- 
cure lodgings at the tavern, took up their quarters on board 
for the night. They had all retired to rest except those who 
were stationed to watch, when, about midnight, the captain 
was informed that several boats filled with men were making 
their way through the darkness, and approaching the Caro- 
line. An alarm was given, but before the sleepers could reach 
the deck, the steamer was boarded by seventy or eighty armed 
men. With oaths and imprecations they commenced an at- 
tack upon the defenseless crew, who, being unarmed, could 
offer no resistance, and fled to escape slaughter. One man 
was shot through the head, two were severely, and several 
slightly wounded ; the steamer was cut loose from her dock, 
set on fire, towed into the current of the river, sent blazing 
into the rapids, and extinguished by the fearful plunge over 



52 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

the mighty cataract. Beacon lights then appeared on the 
Canada shore; and when the boats, still under the cover of 
the night, returned from their dreadful errand, the loud and 
vociferous cheers with which they were greeted, came rolling 
through the darkness to the American shore. The next 
morning the captain of the Caroline found that twelve of the 
thirty-three men who went on board the preceding evening- 
were missing. It was believed that, disabled by their wounds, 
they remained on the Caroline, and had been committed to a 
fate which fills the imagination with horror. 

It afterward appeared that this expedition for the destruc- 
tion of the Caroline had been fitted out by Col. Allen McNab, 
then in command of twenty-five hundred British troops at 
Chippewa, on the opposite side of the river. Two or three 
years later, the responsibility of the affair was assumed hj the 
British government. 

As this act was an invasion of our territory, and an affront 
to our sovereignty, Mr. Fillmore felt, as every patriot ought 
to feel, that it was the duty of the government to make a 
prompt demand for satisfaction. Although the subject be- 
longed to the executive department, he thought it tbe duty 
of Congress to express its sense of the outrage, and accord- 
ingly proposed and pressed repeated resolutions, calling on the 
President to lay before the House such correspondence on the 
subject as had passed between the two governments. In 
order to insure greater promptitude, he made his proposition 
as an amendment to another resolution, which had come up 
for consideration in its order. Opposition being made, 

" Mr. Fillmore said he could not conceive how his propo- 
sition could possibly tend to embarrass the action of the House 
upon the resolution offered by the committee on foreign 
affairs. It was certainly very easy for the President to dis- 
tinguish between the different kinds of information sought for 
by the different propositions. He had tried every other way 



EXCITEMENT ON THE FRONTIER. 53 

to bring his proposition before the House, and could not pre- 
sent it in any form which would secure its immediate consider- 
ation, excepting that in which it now stood. For if it were 
offered as an independent resolution, it would take its place 
behind all others now on the Speaker's table. Its great im- 
portance would not permit him to expose it to such a risk, 
and he had, therefore, offered it in the form of an amendment 
to the original resolution of the committee on foreign affairs, 
in which shape he hoped it would pass. 

"As to the expression which he had used in relation to the 
disturbances of the Niagara frontier, that this country was on 
the eve of a war with Great Britain, perhaps it was too strong 
an expression. But certainly all the facts demonstrated that 
there was imminent danger of such a result. The citizens of 
the United States, while in the peaceful pursuit of their busi- 
ness, had been attacked by an armed force from a foreign 
nation, and a portion of the militia of the country is even now 
ordered out to repel such hostility. 

" He well knew that the spirit of the people on the United 
States side of that frontier would not permit them to stand 
tamely by, and witness such assaults. These were facts, 
vouched for by respectable citizens as true and authentic ; and 
he must ask if they were not such as to warrant the offering 
of such a proposition as he had moved. It makes no differ- 
ence, he contended, whether one or one hundred miles of the 
territory of the United States lias been invaded by the arms 
of a foreign nation; the jurisdiction of this country is co-ex- 
tensive with the utmost limits of her territory. Even if the 
vessel which was attacked had been carrying munitions of war 
to the revolutionists on Navy Island, she was only hable, he 
contended, to be attacked while within the British lines. As 
it was, he agreed with the gentleman from Massachusetts, 
(Mr. Adams,) that there was scarcely a parallel to this act 
upon the pages of our history as a nation ; and it was to sup- 
pose an absolute impossibility, for a moment to imagine that 
the people on that frontier will ever submit to the occurrence 
of such acts without complaint and redress. It was, there- 
fore, in any view, highly important that the House should 
obtain all possible information upon a subject so important." 

In urging a similar resolution on a subsequent occasion, 
Mr. Fillmore assigned as a reason, that the information might 



54 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

be important to the House, in case it should become necessary 
to arm the frontier. During the second session of the next 
Congress, when the arrest and trial of McLeod had again 
called attention to the subject, and renewed the excitement on 
the frontier, a resolution calling on the Executive for informa- 
tion was again passed, at the instance of Mr. Fillmore. It 
was responded to by the President, who communicated the 
correspondence between the Secretary of State and the 
British minister. This correspondence was referred to the 
committee on foreign affairs, who made a report which went 
beyond the particular case, and entered into a general incul- 
pation of the British government. Jealous as Mr. Fillmore 
was of the honor of his country, his sense of justice led him 
to disapprove of the tone of that report, especially as he 
thought it had a tendency to inflame the excitement, which 
already ran too high, and endangered the peace of the "country. 
In the course of his remarks, objecting to the printing of this 
report, Mr. Fillmore said : 

** But one thing, at all events, should be borne in mind by 
all whose duty requires them to act on this subject here. 
There is a great state of excitement on that frontier, which 
might hy possibility lead to an outbreak. My objection to 
the printing of the report was, that it was calculated to inflame 
the pubhc mind; and I was governed in that vote by three 
reasons. In the first place, I did not wish that anything 
should be done here which might have a tendency to do in- 
justice to the individual who is soon to be tried by the laws 
of the State of New York. I desire that the law should have 
its free action, that no excitement should be raised against 
McLeod, which might prevent a fair and impartial trial. In 
the second place, I do not desire that any action on the part 
of this House should compromise or control the Executive of 
this nation in the negotiations now pending between the 
government of the United States and the government of 
Great Britain. I have all confidence in the incoming adminis- 
tration. If this controversy can be amicably and honorably 



KEMAKKS IN CONGKESS. 55 

settled between the two governments, I desire that it should. 
But there is a third and very strong reason in my mind 
against anything being done to exasperate the public mind 
on the subject of war with Great Britain. It is this: for 
three or four years I have used all the exertions in my power 
to induce this administration, which is responsible to the 
country, to provide some means of defense on our jSTorthern 
frontier. But all my efforts were in vain. And yet the 
gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Pickens) now tells us 
that the course to be pursued to avoid a war with Great 
Britain, is to stand up to her — to threaten her — to take a high 
stand; and that, he says, will avert a war. I may have been 
mistaken in the meaning. I know that those were not his 
words. But I would submit to him that the best way to 
avoid a war with Great Britain, is to show that we are pre- 
pared to meet her, if there is to be war; because reasonable 
preparations for defense are better than gasconading. 

" Mr. Fillmore then alluded to the defenseless condition of 
the Northern frontier. He desired, and believed the whole 
country desired, that we should yield nothing to the demands 
of Great Britain, to which she was not fairly entitled. But, 
at the same time, he regarded it as rather the act of a mad- 
man, to precipitate the country into a war before it was pre- 
pared for it, than the act of a statesman. In his section of 
country, the people would yield nothing to Great Britain to 
which she was not justly entitled; or they would yield it only 
with the last drop of their blood. But he did not wish pre- 
maturely to be drawn into war; he did not wish to invite 
Great Britain to invade our defenseless coast. The true plan 
was to prepare for war if we had yet to come to it, but to do 
nothing in the way of bragging. If it did come, gentlemen 
would not find his (Mr. F.'s) 'people shrinking from their just 
share of responsibility. All they had — their property, their 
lives, everything — they were willing to devote, if need ,be, to 
the service and honor of their country. But, was it not the 
.part of wisdom and prudence, before we made a declaration 
of war, to prepare for it ? This was all he desired ; and if this 
report was calculated to stir up a war feeling, without corre- 
sponding preparation being made to meet the consequences, 
he, for one, was opposed to it. He did not wish the country 
to be disgraced by defeat. When she must go to war, he 



66 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

desired to see her prepared for it ; he desired to see her placed 
in a situation which would enable her to bid defiance to the 
power of any government on earth." 

This extract evinces the same combination of patriotism and 
courage, with moderation and wisdom, which afterward dis- 
tinguished the foreign policy of his admirable administration. 

Another subject in which Mr. Fillmore felt deep interest, 
was connected with the organization of the House of Re- 
presentatives, at the opening of the twenty-sixth Congress. 
In accordance with the usual custom, the clerk of the last 
House proceeded to call the roll. When he reached New 
Jersey, which was entitled to six members, he called the name 
of one, and said there were five others, who likewise had cer- 
tificates of election from the governor of the State, but vthat 
he had been furnished with papers q^uestioning the validity of 
their election, and therefore declined to call their names until 
he should know the pleasure of the House. If the political 
parties in the house had not been pretty equally balanced, a 
circumstance of this kind would have occasioned no difficulty 
or delay. The certificates of the governor, authenticated by 
the seal of the State, would have been received without hesi- 
tation as prima facie evidence of election; the members 
would have been sworn; and if, after the organization, their 
seats had been contested by other claimants, the subject 
would havb been referred to a committee for investigation, 
preparatory to the final decision of the House. 

But in this case, parties were so nearly balanced that the 
organization would be given to the Whigs or Democrats, accord- 
ing as the claimants holding the certificates of the governor 
were admitted or rejected. The Democrats, therefore, con- 
tended that it was the duty of the House to decide this ques- 
tion before proceeding to elect a Speaker, while the Whigs, on 
the contrary, claimed that certificates of the governor should 
be regarded as conclusive, until the House was regularly 



THE NEW JERSEY ELECTION CASE. 67 

organized. On the fourth day of the session, John Quincy 
Adams was elected temporary chairman, and two weeks were 
consumed before the House was ready to commence balloting 
for a Speaker. The discussion in which all this time had been 
consumed, hinged on the question whether the New Jersey 
members who held the governor's certificates, should be per- 
mitted to take their seats and participate in the organization 
of the House. Their places were lost (as was charged a day 
or two afterward in debate) in consequence of Henry A. 
Wise's lack in parliamentary skill in proposing an affirmative 
resolution for their admission, instead of a negative one for 
their rejection. The vote happened to be a tie, and the reso- 
lution was lost. Had it been negative instead of affirmative, it 
would have been lost in the same manner, and by the failure 
of a vote to reject them, the members would have been per- 
mitted to take their seats. As soon as the Speaker had been 
chosen, the discussion of the New Jersey contested seats was 
resumed, and occupied the House so entirely, to the obstruc- 
tion of all regular business, that the standing committees were 
not announced till the end of December. Even thenlhe case 
had not been decided, and indeed had scarcely begun to be 
inirestigated. The committee on elections, therefore, became 
one of the most important in the House, from the great inter- 
est which attached to the New Jersey case, and the pervading 
excitement of the public mind. Mr. Fillmore was assigned a 
prominent place on that committee, and distinguished himself 
by the zeal and ability with which he supported the claim of 
the New Jersey members. But with a majority, both of the 
House and the committee, against him, it was not to have been 
expected that he would be successful in controlling a result 
which was determined on strictly party grounds. The investiga- 
tion ran on until nearly the middle of March. Mr. Fillmore was 
prevented from reading a minority report, and, by an appeal 
from the decision of the Chair, who, in determining a point of 



58 BIOGEAPHY OF MILLABD FILLMORE. 

order, had assigned him the floor, he was silenced while attempt- 
ing to make a speech. Mr. Fillmore was justly indignant at 
treatment so unfair, and finding it impossible to gain ^ hearing 
in the House, he addressed a long and very elaborate letter to 
his constituents, in which he ably, and with great clearness, 
argued all the questions involved in the New Jersey case. 
The manner in which he was treated by the majority showed 
how formidable they considered his opposition. The ability 
and spirit he evinced in that celebrated controversy had a great 
influence in gaining for him the confidence of his party and 
giving him his important position in the next Congress, when 
the Whio-s came into power. His immediate constituents tes- 
tified their approbation of his course by bestowing on him at 
the next election the largest majority ever given in his con- 
gressional district. 



THE TWENTY-SEVENTH CONGKESS. 59 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE TWENTY-SEVENTH CONGRESS. 

The twenty-seventh Congress was one of the most memo- 
rable that has ever assembled under our government. No 
presidential election has ever excited a deeper interest — no 
electioneering campaign has ever been conducted with greater 
warmth and spirit — no political revolution recorded in our 
annals has ever been more complete, than that of 1840. This 
great movement was the consequence of wide-spread financial 
distress, which had pervaded the country for the two or three 
preceding years. Banks, all over the country, had either 
broken down or suspended specie payments; merchants and 
manufacturers were ruined ; business was in a state of stagna- 
tion ; and the pubHc mind had become deeply impressed with 
the idea that the general embarrassment and bankruptcy 
under which the country suffered, was due to political causes. 
Whether justly or unjustly, the party in power was held 
responsible for the deplorable condition of the country. That 
mighty uprising of the masses by which the administration of 
Mr. Van Buren was overthrown, not only elected a new Presi- 
dent, but brought together a Congress entertaining political 
principles the reverse of those which had prevailed in the 
public councils during the remarkable period composed of the 
twelve preceding years. 

It is not our province to review the controversies which were 
then conducted with so much vehemence, or to discuss the 
policy of either of ihe great parties of that interesting period. 



60 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

At this distance of time, when the passions excited by hot 
debate have subsided, the issues involved do not seem invested 
with the all-absorbing importance they were then thought to 
possess. The sub-treasury, then a principal object of partisan 
assault, has come to be universally regarded as wise and sal- 
utary, none of the evils having followed which were predicted 
from its operation; a national bank, then regarded by one 
party as the great panacea for curing all the disorders of the 
currency, is admitted to be as unnecessary as it is obsolete; 
while within the last few months we have seen a Democratic 
secretary of the treasury recommending a tariflf which discrim- 
inates for the advantage of American manufacturers, and a 
Democratic member of the United States Senate advocating 
a bill to carry out the recommendation. It is a strong proof 
of Mr. Fillmore's sagacity, that during the very heat and 
fervor of those controversies, his views were substantially 
those which the public opinion of the country has since en- 
dorsed. True, he was a party man, and his opinions were 
colored by his pohtical associations; but it is an evidence of 
the clearness of his intellect that, so far as he differed from his 
party he leaned toward the views which the progress of 
opinion has shown to be correct. We saw, in our last chap- 
ter, that as early as 1837 he had ceased to attach any import- 
ance to a United States Bank. We shall see, in the course 
of the present chapter, that while he was a tariff man, and 
the author of the celebrated tariflf of 1842, his views of the 
protective policy were so moderate and rational, that few men 
of any political party would be found to dissent from them at 
present. 

The prominent position assigned to Mr. Fillmore in the 
twenty-seventh Congress, is a proof of the confidence inspired 
by his previous congressional career. No sooner did his party 
come into power, than they manifested tlieir high appreciation 
of his wisdom by assigning him the most difficult and responsible 



CHAIRMAN OF WAYS AND IMEANS. 61 

post in the national legislature. The political revolution which 
had just been achieved owed its success to the financial em- 
barrassments of the country and the general prostration of 
business. Not only private but public credit had become 
impaired, the resources of the government being as inadequate 
to its wants as those of individuals. The annual revenues had 
sunk to thirteen millions; the annual expenditures had gone 
up to thirty-seven millions; and the government was largely 
in debt. As financial difficulties had brought the new admin- 
istration into power, it was its chief duty to devise financial 
remedies. The country looked to it for the restoration of con- 
fidence, the revival of credit, the recovery of business from its 
prostration, and the extrication of the national treasury from 
impending bankruptcy. The highest mark of confidence which 
the Whig party could at that time have bestowed on any mem- 
ber of Congress, was to make him chairman of the committee 
of ways and means. From the beginning of the government 
all revenue bills have originated in the House of Representa- 
tives, and the labor of maturing such bills devolves on the 
committee of ways and means. The chairman of that com- 
mittee, besides being its most prominent and influential mem- 
ber, is the organ through which it communicates with the 
House. He not only takes a leading part in devising measures 
and arranging their details, but is expected to explain them to 
the House, defend them against objections, and ward oflf the 
assaults of keen-sighted adversaries. These duties, at all times 
arduous, became doubly so when a party newly elevated to 
power was about to inaugurate a new financial poHcy. That 
Millard Fillmore was placed in this responsible position shows 
that he must have given previous proofs of great capacity. 
The manner in which he acquitted himself in it, not only 
justified the confidence of his friends, but won for him laurels 
which any statesman might be proud to wear. When he 
retired from Congress his reputation was as wide as the limits 



b)i BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

of the country. By general acclamation he was declared to be 
one of the ablest and most patriotic members of a party which 
boasted the possession of many great men. 

The course of our narrative takes us over ground which has 
been the battle-field of contending political parties. That the 
subject of this sketch belonged to one of those parties is im- 
plied in the fact that he acted a prominent part in the legisla- 
tion of the country. If we dwell at some length on those parts 
of his public career by which he acquired distinction, it is not 
for the purpose of defending the politics of the past, but to 
fulfill the task we have assumed, of laying before the reader 
a candid and impartial account of Mr. Fillmore's public life, 
and exhibiting the proofs he has given of eminent capacity for 
public aftairs. If the political history of the country extended 
back only twenty-five years, it could easily be made to appear 
that a protective tariflf was a purely party measure. But when 
we go beyond that period, and take in the whole history of 
the government, it will be seen that the principle of protection 
is no more a Whig than it is a Democratic doctrine. AH our 
Presidents, down to John Quincy Adams, have publicly recom- 
mended protection ; and even Jackson himself, previous to his 
elevation to the presidency, showed himself as strong a pro- 
tectionist as there was in the country. These facts are men- 
tioned, not as arguments either for or against protection, but 
to prove that Mr. Fillmore's identification with that policy in 
1842, does not necessarily identify him now with any particu- 
lar party of our past politics. When Mr. Clay named that 
policy the American system, he disclosed the motive for its 
adoption, which no doubt acted powerfully on his own mind 
and on those of many other patriotic men. It was thought 
that to protect American industry would foster an American 
spirit and cultivate a deeper feehng of nationality. Whatever 
may be thought of the means, the motive was truly patriotic. 
The fires of American feeling which have recently burst forth 



GEN. JACKSON'S TABIFF LETTER. 63 

"with so much splendor, have always dimly smouldered beneath 
the ashes of the old political parties. Desire for a distinctive 
American nationality is a sentiment which has often sought 
expression in the politics of the country, and nowhere can we 
trace it more legibly than in the history of opinion on the sub- 
ject of a protective tariff. We will make one or two quotations 
in illustration of this point, and prefer to draw them from Dem- 
ocratic sources. 

The following is an extract from a letter of Gen. Jackson to 
Dr. L. H. Coleman, of North Carolina, dated Washington, 
August 26th, 1824: 

* * * * « Heaven smiled upon and gave us liberty and 
independence. The same Providence has blessed us with the 
means of national independence and national defense. If we 
omit or refuse to use the gifts which he has extended to us, 
we deserve not the continuance of his blessing. He has filled 
our mountains and our plains with minerals — with lead, iron, 
and copper — and given us a climate and soil for the growing 
of hemp and wool. These being the great materials of our 
national defense, they ought to have extended to them ade- 
quate and fair protection, that our manufacturers and laborers 
may be placed in a fair competition with those of Europe, and 
that we may have within our country a supply of these lead- 
ing and important articles so essential to war. 

"I will ask, what is the real situation of the agriculturist? 
Where has the American farmer a market for his surplus pro- 
duce ? Except for cotton, he has neither a foreign nor a home 
market. Does not this clearly prove, when there is no market 
at home, or abroad, that there is too much labor employed in 
agriculture ? Common sense at once points out the remedy. 
Take from agriculture in the United States six hundred thou- 
sand men, women, and children, and you will at once give a mar- 
ket for more breadstuff's than all Europe now furnishes us with. 

" In short, sir, we have been too long subject to the policy 
of British merchants. It is time we should become a little 
more Americanized, and instead of feeding paupers and labor- 
ers of England, feed our own; or else, in a short time, by con- 
tinuing our present policy, we shall be paupers ourselves. 



64 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMORE. 

"It is, therefore, my opinion, that a careful and judicious 
tariff is much wanted, to pay our national debt, and to afford 
us the means of that defense within ourselves, on which the 
safety of our country and liberties depends ; and last, though 
not least, give a proper distribution of our labor, which must 
prove beneficial to the happiness, wealth, and independence 
of the community. 

"I am very respectfully, 

♦* Your obedient servant, 

" Andrew Jackson." 

The Tammany Society of New York is one of the oldest 
Democratic associations in the country. In the year 1819, it 
pubhshed an elaborate circular bearing the following title: 
"Address of the Society of Tammany, or Columbian Order, 
to its absent members, and the members of its several branches 
throuo-hout the United States." From this address we make 

o 

the following extracts : 

" To divide and conquer, is the maxim of our constitutional 
enemy. The encouragement of our domestic resources will 
make us a united people. This nation will become one great 
family, giving and taking from each other. Let us, then, trea- 
sure up the maxim of wisdom, that concert is stronger than 
numbers. Another benefit, and not among the least which 
would arise from the encouragement of domestic manufactures, 
would be the exclusion of all foreign agents, whether Scotch, 
English, French, or German. This species of cormorant char- 
acter holds in its hand the capital of some man abroad, who 
never intends to step his foot upon our shores, and with this 
capital extracts from the country the profits of its traffic, on a 
perfect commercial equality with the American citizen. This 
is continued until he accumulates a given heap of riches for 
himself and his patron, and then, after oppressing all around 
him to wind up his affairs, he modestly returns to his foreign 
home, aod, retiring in opulence, contributes to the wealth and 
resources of that nation which might next declare war against 
us. This is, in fact, furnishing the sinews of war to other 
nations, for it would be American profits on which this agent 
would live in his own country. The truth is, that we have 



THE TAMMANY ADDRESS. 65 

progressed so far, that we want no population, and should 
receive none, except those who intend to spend their lives and 
increase their posterity among us. As the United States are 
inhabited by more foreign agents than any nation on earth, in 
proportion to their population, it will appear, upon calculation, 
that this is a very improvident mode of parting with the na- 
tional treasure. Banish the foreign goods as far as our manu- 
factures, under the magnanimous care of Congress, can banish 
them, and the visits of those vultures would soon cease. In 
their place would stand the honest manufacturer, receiving a 
fair profit for the fabric of his own hand. But the picture of 
evil, arising from these foreign agents, has not been sufficiently 
extended. Their transactions with our citizens are often insid- 
ious and oppressive. They have not the sympathies of coun- 
try or national fellow-feeling to meliorate their cupidity. In 
their indulgences they are actuated by interest alone, and in 
their enforcement of debts they are restrained by no princi- 
ples. They are at this moment to be seen in swarms, in their 
visits to the interior of our country, and our remotest western 
waters. And such is the prejudice with which they are viewed 
by the honest, but embarrassed debtors in those places, that 
they have entailed upon themselves the name of that gloomy 
bird which hovers over and lives upon the carrion of the desert." 
% Hi * * ***** 

" The want of reciprocity — or rather the wise internal 
policy of other nations as to the rights of foreign agents — 
the consumption of foreign productions, and the encourage- 
ment of foreign manufactures, are to us loud warnings to draw 
to ourselves, and cherish the indigenous strength with which 
Providence has blessed us. * * * It would be found 
that the encouragement of domestic manufactures in the modes 
above pointed out, would essentially lead to habits of economy^ 
both in the people and the government, as such. For when 
this highly simple and American system shall have begun to 
operate, many concomitant habits, partaking of its character, 
will be seen in its train." 

These extracts and General Jackson's letter to Dr. Coleman, 
prove that a protective tariff is not a policy peculiar to any one 
party of the past ; and that whatever may be its merits or 



66 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

demerits on other grounds, many of those who have cherished 
it did so under the impression that it would be the means of 
cultivating a more purely American spirit, and of preventing 
foreigners from depriving us of advantages which belong to 
our own people. Whatever may be thought of the doctrine, 
members of the American party must pardon something to 
the spirit in which it was cherished. 

We have already remarked that although Mr. Fillmore was 
the author of the tariff of 1842, and acquired great reputation 
from the ability with which he advocated it, his views were so 
moderate and just, that they would even at present command 
nearly universal assent. Of course no one understands us to 
mean that it would be wise to revive the tariff of 1842. That 
was a svstem adapted to the peculiar exigencies of the time, 
exigencies which have long since passed. But the general 
principles on which it was founded may even now be pre- 
sented without incurring the hazard that they will run counter 
to the general opinion of the country. 

We make the following extract from a speech delivered by 
Mr. Fillmore in the House of Representatives, June 9th, 1842: 

"Although this is the view which I am disposed to take of 
this bill, and although I am wilhng to listen to any ametid- 
ments to add to or diminish the duty on any article, with a 
view of increasing the revenue, yet I have no disguise of my 
own sentiments on the subject of protecting our own industry. 
I am free to admit that I am not one of those who either feel, 
or profess to feel, indifferent to our own interests. I prefer 
my own country to all otliers, and my opinion is that we must 
take care of ourselves ; and while I would not embarrass trade 
between this and any foreign country by any illiberal restric- 
tions, yet, if by legislation or negotiation, an advantage is to 
be given to one over the other, I prefer my own country to all 
the world besides. I admit that duties may be so levied, 
ostensibly for revenue, yet designedly for protection, as to 
amount to prohibition, and consequently to the total loss of 
revenue. I am for no such protection as that. I have no 



SPEECH ON THE TARIFF. 67. 

disguise of my opinions on this subject. I believe that if all 
the restrictive systems were done away with, here and in 
every other country, and we could contidently rely on con- 
tinued peace, that would be the most prosperous and happy 
state. The people of every country would then produce that 
which their habits, skill, cjimate, soil, or situation enabled them 
to produce to the greatest advantage; each would then sell 
where he could obtain the most, and buy where he could pur- 
chase cheapest ; and thus we should see a trade as free among 
the nations of the world as we now witness among the several 
States of this Union. But, however beautiful this may be in 
theory, I look for no such political millennium as this. Wars 
will occur until man changes his nature ; and duties will be 
imposed upon^our products in other countries, until man shall 
cease to be selfish, or kings can find a more convenient mode 
of raising revenue than by imposts. 

" These, then, form the true justification for laying duties in 
a way to protect our own industry against that of foreign 
nations. First. A reasonable apprehension of war, for no 
nation can always hope to be at peace. If, therefore, there is 
any article that is indispensably necessary for the subsistence 
of a nation, and the nation can produce it, that nation is not 
independent if it do not. If it is necessary, the production 
should be encouraged by high duties on the imported article. 
This should be done, not for the benefit of persons who may 
engage in the manufacture or cultivation of the desired article, 
but for the benefit of the whole community: what though 
each pays a little higher for the article in time of peace than 
he otherwise would, yet he is fully compensated for this in 
time of war. He then has this necessary, of which he would 
be wholly deprived had he not prt-vided for it by a httle self- 
sacrifice. We all act upon this principle individually; and 
why should we not as a nation ? We accumulate in time of 
plenty for a day of famine and distress. Every man pays, 
from year to year, a small sum to insure his house against fire, 
submitting willingly to this annual tax, that, when the day of 
misfortune comes, (if come it shall,) the overwhelming calam- 
ity of having all destroyed may be mitigated by receiving- 
back from the insurer a partial compensation for the loss. It 
is upon the same principle that we maintain an. army and a 
navy in time of peace, and pour out millions annually for their 



6S BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

support: not because we want them then, but because it is 
reasonable to apprehend that war may come, and then they 
will be wanted; and it is a matter of economy to provide 
and discipline them in time of peace, to mitigate the evils 
of war when it does come. The same reason requires us to 
encourage the production of any indispensable article of sub- 
sistence. I shall not stop now to inquire what these articles 
are. Every one can judge for himself. But that there are 
many such, no one can doubt. 

" But, secondly, there is yet another case where I hold that 
we are not only justified, but required to encourage and pro- 
tect our own industry ; and I regret to say that this is a case, 
which, for obvious reasons, always has, and 1 fear always will 
exist: it is where foreign nations, by their ow^n legislation, 
exclude our products from their markets, We, as a whole, 
are an agricultural nation, occupying one of the broadest and 
most fertile tracts of country in the world. The South pro- 
duces sugar, cotton, rice, and tobacco; and the North and 
West produce beef, pork, and breaclstuffs. It appears, by the 
last census, that we have 3,717,756 persons engaged in agri- 
culture, and only 791,545 in manufactures and trades, being 
nearly five to one employed in agriculture. Our lands are 
cheap and our soils productive ; but if other nations prohibit 
the introduction of our agricultural products to their markets 
by high duties, what is our remedy ? We want their manu- 
factures ; we offer them our breadstuffs in exchange ; but they 
refuse to receive them: what shall we do? I say, meet re- 
striction by restriction. Impose duties on their manufactures, 
and thereby encourage a portion of our own people, now rais- 
ing wheat and corn to rot in their granaries, to engage in 
manufactures, thus lessening the amount of agricultural pro- 
ducts by converting a part of your producers into consumers, 
thereby creating a home market for your agricultural products, 
and thus raising their price. Is not this just? Great Britain 
has no right to complain that we meet restriction by restric- 
tion. We offer her our flour, pork and beef, for her iron, 
cloths, and other manufarstures. She refuses our products, 
and draws upon our specie, crippling our banks, deranging our 
currency, and paralyzing our industry. We must protect 
ourselves, create and preserve a market for our own products. 



SPEECH ON THE TARIFF. 69 

until she will consent to meet us on equal terms ; and this, 
not by way of retaliation, but in self-defense. 

" But it may be said that this protection is given for the 
purpose of benefiting those engaged in manufactures. I am 
wholly opposed to legislating for one part of the community at 
the expense of another. All are equally entitled to our pro- 
tection; and if duties are so levied as to protect any particular 
manufacture, it must be because the nation has an interest in 
encouraging it, and not for the benefit of those engaged in it. 
It is all idle to think of benefiting any particular class by pro- 
tection. This can only be done by giving a monopoly to a few 
individuals. No monopoly can be created by laying duties. 
If the duties raise the price so high as to tempt persons to 
engage in the manufacture, every one is at liberty to do so; 
and the consequence usually is, that so many engage that they 
soon compete with each other ; and, instead of being profitable 
to themselves, they cheapen the article to the consumer, 
while the manufacturer makes little or nothing. I say, there- 
fore, again, that it is all idle to talk of protection for the benefit 
of particular classes. It should never be given but for the 
benefit of the community; and, if designed for any other 
object, an over-ruling law of trade (as I have shown) will 
inevitably defeat that design. 

'* But I take a distinction between the encouragement and 
protection of manufacturers. It is one thing for the govern- 
ment to encourage its citizens to abandon their ordinary pur- 
suits and engage in a particular branch of industry; and a 
very difierent thing whether the government is bound to 
protect that industry by laws similar to those by which it 
encouraged its citizens to embark in it. In the first case, 
there is no obligation on the part of the government. Its act 
is entirely voluntary and spontaneous. It may or may not 
encourage the production or manufacture of a particular article, 
as it shall judge best for the whole community. Before at- 
tempting it, the government should weigh well the advantages 
and disadvantages which are likely to result to the whole, and 
not to the particular class which may be tempted to engage. 
If a particular branch of industry is so important in its bear- 
ings upon the public wants, on account of its providing in time 
of peace for some necessary article in time of war, then, as 
the strongest advocates of free trade themselves admit, the 



70 EIOGEAiPHT OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

government may and should legislate witli a view to encourage 
its establishment; and so, likewise, if it be necessary to provide 
a home market for our products in consequence of the prohibi- 
tory duties levied upon them by foreign countries. But all 
these are questions to be decided according to the circum- 
stances of each particular case; and (as I said) the decision 
should be made with a view to the benefit of all, and not of a 
few, or of any particular class or section of country. But 
when the government has decided' that it is best to give the 
encouragement, and the citizen has been induped by our 
legislation to abandon his former pursuits, and to invest his 
capital and apply his skill and labor to the production of the 
article thus encouraged by government, then a new question 
arises — for another party has become interested — and that is, 
whether we will, by our subsequent legislation, withdraw our 
'protection from the citizen whom we have thus encouraged to 
embark his all in a particular branch of business for the good 
of the public, and overwhelm him with ruin by our unsteady, 
not to say perfidious, legislation. I can consent to no such 
thing. It seems to me to be manifestly unjust. Our act in 
the first instance is free and voluntary. We may give the 
encouragement or not : but, having given it, the public faith 
is, to a certain extent, pledged. Those who have accepted 
our invitation, and embarked in these new pursuits, have done 
so under the implied promise on our part that the encourage- 
ment thus given should not be treacherously withdrawn, and 
that we would not tear down what we had encouraged them 
to build up. This I conceive to be a just, clear, and broad 
distinction between encourag'^ement beforehand and protection 
afterward. The former is voluntary^ depending wholly upon 
considerations of public policy and expediency ; the latter is a 
matter of good faith to those who have trusted to the na- 
tional honor. 

" These are m}^ views on the subject of encouraging and 
protecting home industry by legislation; not that I deem them 
of any importance to the bill under consideration — for I regard 
this as a revenue bill, and to be passed and justified on that 
ground. I do not deny that the etfect will be to encourage 
and protect home manufactures, and thereby create a home 
market for our agricultural products — and others, as well as 
myself, may vote for it more willingly on this account ; yet all 



THE TARIFF. tl 

this is a mere incident of raising revenue by imposing duties 
on o'oods imported. It depends not on design or intent: it 
results as a necessary and inevitable consequence. We can 
not avoid it if we would. If we impose a duty of one dollar 
on ewerj yard of cloth imported, the duty is laid, not to in- 
crease the value of the cloth, and thereby protect the home 
manufacturer, but to supply the wants of the treasury ; yet, as 
a consequence, it encourages and 2^^'otects the home manufac- 
turer; and we can not avoid it. No human foresight can pre- 
vent it; no ingenuity can avoid it; and, indeed, no design can 
aid it. Intention has nothing to do with the matter." 

It may interest the reader to know what impression Mr. 
Fillmore made on persons who visited the gallery of the House 
during the sessions of the Congress in which he was achieving 
a high standing in his party and a proud position among the 
statesmen of the country. We therefore copy the following 
from a series of sketches which appeared in a literary paper in 
New York city in the summer of 1842 : 

" Millard Fillmore, op New Yore. — This is the distin- 
guished representative from the city of Buffalo, and at present 
chairman of the committee of ways and means, a situation both 
arduous and responsible. He stands in the same relation to 
the United States government in the House of Representatives 
that the chancellor of the exchequer does to the government 
of Great Britain in the House of Parliament. He is emphati- 
cally the financial organ of the legislature. In th^ House of 
Representatives all bills aflfecting the revenue originate. These 
are presented by the ways and means committee — matured 
by it — and its chairman has to explain their object and the data 
upon which they are based. He is obliged to make himself 
thoroughly acquainted with the situation of the national treas- 
ury — has to examine its details — become familiar with its 
wants — its expenditure — its income, present and prospect- 
ive — and be ever ready to give to the house a full exposition 



72 EIOGEAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

of all the measures he may present for consideration. To dis- 
charge the duties which this post enjoins, faithfully, requires 
both physical and mental capacity of a high order, and I be- 
lieve they could not have devolved upon an individual better 
qualified than the subject of this notice. In every respect will 
he be found equal to the task assigned him. 

" Mr. Fillmore in person is perhaps five feet ten inches tall, 
stout and finely formed. His limbs are graceful ; he has an erect 
and easy walk, and a well developed chest. His complexion 
is quite light; has lively blue eyes, a smooth forehead marked 
by breadth rather than height, and retreats slightly into a head 
of thin grayish hair. His face is broad and regular in its out- 
lines; has a small nose, and handsome Grecian mouth and 
white teeth. His features, without being very strongly mark- 
ed, are decidedly expressive and agreeable, and in or out of 
Congress there are few better looking men. His appear- 
ance would attract attention anywhere, as his abilities qualify 
him for any station. In his temperament he is phlegmatic 
— is always self-composed, .and all his acts are controlled 
by the dictates of his judgment. He weighs everything 
in the most prudent manner — enters into a nice calcula- 
tion — and is never misled by the promptings of his heart. 
He is the incarnation of truth and integrity. Never would he 
"hold the word of promise to the ear, and break it to the 
sense." He would never raise hopes and then blast them. 
He is frank, open and manly. In public life and in private he 
is without guile ; pure and untarnished. Indeed I question 
whether he was ever tempted to go astray. He seems not to 
have inherited the frailties generally found among the descend- 
ants of Adam, and hence he may possibly have too Httle charity 
for, and judges too severely of, those less coolly constituted 
than himself. His talents are of a high grade; is a sound 
thinker, and very sagacious; not showy or brilliant, but plain 
and sensible; and never attempts to make a display or to 



AN ESTIMATE OF HIS CHARACTER. 73 

"show off." His judgment is very clear, and he has no emo- 
tions which ever over- ride it; is always to be relied upon, and 
whatever he undertakes he will master. He never takes a 
stride without testing his foothold. He belongs tp that rare-^ 
f class whose merits are developed with every day's use; in f 
/whose minds new beauties and new riches are discovered as 
they are examined into. He has a high legal reputation; 
possesses great industry ; is agree'able in conversation, and his 
information upon general subjects, without being profound, is 
varied and extensive. As a shrewd, sagacious poHtician — by 
this I do not mean that he is particularly skilled in mere par- 
tisan strategy — there are few men in the country superior to 
him — perhaps none. 

" As a public speaker, Mr. Fillmore is not distinguished. He 
is no orator, but a plain matter of fact debater. He never 
soars into the regions of fancy, indulges in rhetorical flourishes, 
or adorns his logic with poetry. The gaudy plumes of fiction 
he leaves other hands to pluck, while he is garnering up the 
stores of reality; nevertheless he is a good and interesting 
speaker — very intellectual, sound and perspicuous — with a 
distinct voice and a dignified easy manner. He speaks not to 
the passions of men, or attempts to move their hearts. He 
aims at their reason and judgment, and his arguments are 
couched in language intelligible to the meanest capacity — 
avoids high-sounding phrases — an evidence of good taste and 
good sense none the less commendable for its rarity among 
public speakers of the present day, who generally, when they 
give birth to a new idea — an occurrence that seldom hap- 
pens — send it forth in a garb so unsuitable and fantastic as 
to hide it from the view of ordinary visions. As a public man, 
I know of none — not one — of greater promise than Mr. F. 
He has many of the highest attributes of greatness, and is 
still a young man, not to exceed forty-one years of age, and 
must continue to rise in public estimation as his character shall 
4 



74: BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

be developed. He has been a member of Congress some six 
years, and was previously an active member of the State As- 
sembly. As a useful, practical, efficient, and enlightened leg- 
islator, he has no superior, and very few equals among his 
associates. * And the Queen City of the Lakes may be justly 
proud, as I know she is, of so able a representativa, so eminent 
a citizen, of a statesman whose public career is so bright and 
so full of promise." 

In July, 1842, Mr. Fillmore addressed a letter to his con- 
stituents declining a re-election. We copy the opening and 
two or three of the closing paragraphs : 

"Fellow-Citizens: Having long since determined not to 
be a candidate for re-election, I have felt that my duty to you 
required that I should give you seasonable notice of that deter- 
mination. The chief causes which have brought me to this 
resolution, being mostly of a personal character, are unimpor- 
tant, and woidd be uninteresting to you or the public. It is 
sufficient to say, that I am not prompted to this course by 
anything in the present aspect of political affairs. Many of 
you know that I desired to withdraw before the last congress- 
ional election, but owing to the importance of that contest, the 
desire for unanimity, and the hope that if the administration 
were changed, I might render some essential local service to 
my district aftd those generous friends who had so nobly sus- 
tained our cause, I was induced to stand another canvass. 
But how sadly have all been disappointed! How has that 
sun which rose in such joyous brightness to millions been 
shrouded in gloom and sorrow! The lamented Harrison, 
around whom clustered a nation's prayers and blessings, is 
now no more. For reasons inscrutable to us, and known only 
to an all-wise Providence, he was cut down in a moment of 
triumph, and in his grave He buried the long cherished hopes 
of a suffering nation. 

********* 

"But, fellow-citizens, I have said more than I intended, and 
regret that I have not time to say it more briefly. I can not, 
however, consent to bring this hasty letter to a close without 



, _^.^fiS A KE-ELECTION TO CONGRESS. 75 

expressing the deep emotions of gratitude that fill my heart 
when I look back upon your kindness and devotion. Pardon 
the personal vanity, though it be a vk^eakness, that induces me 
to recur for a moment to the cherished recollections of your 
early friendship and abiding confidence. I can not give vent 
to the feelings of my heart without it. 

" It is now nearly fourteen years since you did me the un- 
solicited honor to nominate me to represent you in the State 
Legislature. Seven times have I received renewed evidence 
of your confidence by as many elections, with constantly in- 
creasing majorities ; and at the expiration of my present con- 
gressional term, I shall have served you three years in the 
State and eight years in the national councils. I can not call 
to mind the thousand acts of generous devotion from so many 
friends who will ever be dear to my heart, without feeling the 
deepest emotion of gratitude. I came among you a poor and 
friendless boy. You kindly took me by the hand and gave me 
your confidence and support. You have conferred upon me 
distinction and honor, for which I could make no adequate 
return but by an honest and untiring eflfort faithfully to dis- 
charge the high trusts which you confided to my keeping. If 
my humble eSorts have met your approbation, I freely admit 
that next to the approval of my own conscience it is the high- 
est reward which I could receive for days of unceasing toil and 
nights of sleepless anxiety. 

" I profess not to be above or below the common frailties of 
our nature. I will therefore not disguise the fact that I was 
highly gratified at my first election to Congress, yet I can 
truly say that my utmost ambition has been satisfied. I 
aspire to nothing more, and shall retire from the exciting- 
scenes of political strife to the quiet enjoyments of my own 
family and fireside with still more satisfaction than I felt when 
first elevated to this distinguished station. 

" In conclusion permit me again to return you my warmest 
thanks for your kindness, which is deeply engraven upon ray 
heart. *' I remain sincerely and truly, 

" Your friend and fellow-citizen, 

" Millard Fillmore." 

This resolution to retire from public life occasioned profound 
regret. In every part of the country the Whig press expressed 



i$ BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

its sense of the loss the party was about to sustain, and passed 
the highest eillogiums on the public services of a statesman 
who had acquitted himself with so much honor to himself and 
such eminent usefulness to the country. Not only the politi- 
cal press, but some of the most distinguished public men of 
the country paid him compliments which evinced the highest 
appreciation of his public services. John Quincy Adams, for 
example, in a speech to his constituents delivered in the autumn 
o^ 1842, took occasion to say of Mr. Fillmore that "he was 
one of the ablest, most faithful, and fairest-minded men with 
whom it had been his lot to serve in public life." 

Since we have mentioned Mr. Adams, it may not be out of 
place to remark that in the summer of 1843, the veteran 
statesman made a tour to the West, and, among other places, 
visited Buffalo, where the citizens gave him a public reception. 
Mr. Fillmore, whose congressional career had closed, and who 
was residing at home in the practice of his profession, was ap- 
pointed to welcome him, which he did in the following neat 
and felicitous speech : 

" Sir : I have been deputed by the citizens of this place to 
tender you a welcome to our city. In the discharge of this 
grateful duty, I feel that I speak not only my own sentiments, 
but theirs, when I tell you that your long and arduous public 
services — your lofty independence — your punctilious atten- 
tion to business, and, more than all, your unsullied and unsus- 
pected integrity, have given you a chai-acter in the estimation 
of this republic, which calls forth the deepest feelings of ven- 
eration and respect. 

" You see around you, sir, no political partisans seeking to 
promote some sinister purpose ; but you see here assembled 
the people of our infant city, without distinction of party, sex, 
age or condition — all — all anxiously vying with each other 
to show their respect and esteem for your public services and 
private worth. 

" Here, sir, are gathered in this vast multitude of what must 
appear to you strange faces, thousands whose hearts have 



JOHN QTJINCT ADAMS. 77 

vibrated to the chord of sympathy which your written speeches 
have touched. Here is reflecting age, and ardent youth, 
and lisping childhood, to all of whom your venerated name 
is as familiar as household words — all anxious to feast their 
eyes by a sight of that extraordinary and venerable man of 
whom they have heard and read and thought so much — ■ all 
anxious to hear the voice of that ^old man eloquent,^ on whose 
hps wisdom has distilled her choicest nectar — here, sir, you 
see them all, and read in their eager and joy-gladdened counte- 
nances and brightly beaming eyes, a welcome — a thrice-told, 
heart-felt, and soul-stirring welcome to ' the man whom they 
delight to honor.' " 

Mr. Adams made a long and eloquent reply, from which we 
extract the paragraphs relating to Mr. Fillmore : 

" Mr. Fillmore, Mr. Mayor and Fellow-Citizens: I must 
ask your indulgence for a moment's pause to take breath. If 
you ask me why I ask this indulgence, it is because I am so 
overpowered by the eloquence of my friend the chairman of 
the committee of ways and means, whom I have so long been 
accustomed to refer to in that capacity, that, with your permis- 
sion, I will continue so to denominate him now, that I have no 
words left to answer him. For so liberal has he been in be- 
stowing that eloquence upon me, which he himself possesses 
in so eminent a degree that, while he was ascribing to me 
talents so far above my own consciousness in that regard, I 
was all the time imploring the god of eloquence to give me, at 
least at this moment, a iew words to justify him before you in 
making that splendid panegyric which he has been pleased to 
bestow upon me; and that the flattering picture which he has 
presented to you, may not immediately be defaced before your 
eyes by what you should hear from me." 

" I congratulate you again upon your possession of another 
dear and intimate friend of mine, in the person of the gentle- 
man who has just addressed me in your name, and whom I 
have taken the liberty of addressing as chairman of thB com- 
mittee of ways and means — the capacity in which he has 
rendered so recently services of the highest importance to 



78 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

you his constituents, by whose favor he was enabled to render 
them — to us, and our common country. And I can not for- 
bear to express here my regret at his retirement in the pres- 
ent emergency from the councils of the nation. There, or 
elsewhere, I hope and trust he will soon return; for whether 
to the nation or to the State, no service can be, or ever will be 
rendered by a more able or a more faithful public servant." 

After his withdrawal from Congress, Mr. Fillmore continued 
to reside in Buffalo, and was very much devoted to his profes- 
sion. A large and lucrative practice in the higher courts gave 
him constant, and to a person of his laborious habits and love 
of business, pleasant occupation. In this manner he passed 
four or five years, enjoying the esteem of his fellow-citizens and 
laying the foundations of a competency which has enabled him 
to live with the dignity befitting his posit'on, (although with 
the simplicity which accords with his repubhcan tastes,) since 
his retirement from the highest office in the country. 



OPENING OF THE CAMPAIGN. T9 



CHAPTER V. 

THE PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 1844. 

Mr. Fillmore's last congressional term expired in March, 
1843. During the following summer his name was mentioned 
in connection with the Vice-presidency, and his claims as a 
candidate were urged with much enthusiasm by a large num- 
ber of the most respectable Whig presses. By the spon- 
taneous and universal sentiment of the Whig party, it had 
been settled, for a long period in advance of the national con- 
vention, that Henry Clay would be the candidate for the first 
office. This eloquent and patriotic statesman was no doubt 
the private choice of a majority of his party in 1840; but the 
fact that he had been beaten, in 1832, by General Jackson, 
on the bank issue, rendered it inexpedient, both in his own 
estimation and that of his friends, that he should be again 
brought forward until the prospects should preponderate 
pretty strongly in favor of his success. Many of his friends 
supposed this time had arrived in 1840, and felt great dis- 
satisfaction when they were over-ruled by the majority of 
the convention, who were of the opinion that General Har- 
rison was a more available candidate. No man in the United 
States had so many personal friends as Mr. Clay, and his 
vigorous opposition to the administration of John Tyler, re- 
moved all doubt of his availability in 1844 — there never having 
been any of his pre-eminent fitness. 

The Whigs of New York, proud of Mr. Fillmore's talents 
and standing, desired to see his name on the same ticket with 
Mr. Clay's, and determined to present it to the national 



80 BIOGKAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

convention. In October, 1843, the editor of the New York 
Tribune made the following expression of opinion: "I have 
just returned from a four weeks ramble at the West, and have 
some comments to make in due season, on events and occur- 
rences in my absence. For the present, however, I must be 
content with a remark on a single point — the Vice-presidency. 
While I believe the selection of the Whig candidate should be 
left, as nearly as may be, to the unbiassed and unembarrassed 
choice of a national convention, and, therefore, do not care to 
engage in any newspaper discussion on the subject, I shall 
avoid misapprehension by stating that my own first choice has 
long been Millard Fillmore." This preference was fully 
shared by the Whigs of New York. 

The Whig national convention met at Baltimore on the first 
of May, 1844. Hon. Ambrose Spencer, of New York, was 
chosen president, and twenty-six vice-presidents and six secre- 
taries were appointed. As soon as the organization was com- 
pleted, Henry Clay was nominated by acclamation, as the 
Whig candidate for the Presidency. The convention merely 
ratified a nomination that had been previously settled by the 
people. 

Respecting the candidate for Vice-president, there was con- 
siderable difference of opinion, and a choice was not effected 
until the convention had balloted three times. John Davis, 
of Massachusetts, was supported by the delegates from the 
Eastern States; Mr. Fillmore by those from the State of New 
York, and some of the Western States; Theodore Frelinghuy- 
sen by those from New Jersey, and other States. On the 
third ballot, Mr. Frelinghuysen received a majority of the 
votes, and was declared nominated. 

The. author of the *' Life and Times of Silas Wright," al- 
though a Democrat, in describing the proceedings of this 
convention, speaks of the Whig candidates for Vice-president 
in the following handsome terms: 



CANDIDATE FOR GOVERNOR. 81 

** It is remarkable that a great number, and we believe a 
majority of the men who have most attracted public attention 
and most influenced public opinion in the State of New York, 
and indeed in several of the other States, are self-made men, 
who have risen to distinction by their personal merit and their 
own individual efforts, without the aid of wealth or influential 
connections. This is eminently the case with Mr. Fillmore. 
We believe he did not come to the bar very early in life. At 
any rate, before he had practiced law a suflScient length of time 
to distinguish himself in his profession, he was elected to the 
Assembly of this State from the county of Erie. He had not 
been long in public life when he was elected a member of 
Congress from the district that included the county in which 
he resided. In Congress, by his industry, talents, and great 
moderation and prudence, he soon acquired a powerful and 
commanding influence ; and during the last Congress, of >which 
he was a member, he was chairman of the committee of ways 
and means, a position the most honorable and responsible of 
any in the House of Representatives. In that situation he 
discharged so well and so ably his duties, that when he left 
that body, perhaps no member of it held a higher standing in 
the house or the nation than he. Mr. Frelinghuysen, however, 
had been a senator of the United States ; he was the favorite 
of the Whigs in New Jersey, and the party were desirous of 
strengthening themselves in that State ; besides, he was a man 
of respectable talents, great erudition, and highly distinguished 
for purity of character, for piety, and all the private and social 
virtues." 

As soon as the result of the national convention became 
known, there was a general expression of opinion among the 
Whigs of New ^ork, in favor of making Mr. Fillmore their 
candidate for Governor. It was contrary to his wishes to run 
for that office, and he addressed a letter to the editor of the 
Albany Evening Journal, assigning the reasons why he did 
not wish his name to be used. We copy his letter. 

"New York, May 16th, 1844. 
"Thurlow Weed, Esq. — My Dear Sir — Being here in at- 
tendance upon the Supreme Court, my attention has been 
4* 



82 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

called to an article in your paper of the 8th instant, and to 
some extracts from other journals in yours since that time, in 
which my name is mentioned as a candidate for nomination to 
the gubernatorial office in this State. You do me the justice to 
say that ' I have never desired the office of Governor, though 
1 admit the right of the people to the services of a public man 
in any station they may think proper to assign him/ My 
maxim has always been that individuals have no claim upon 
the public for official favors, but that the public has a right to 
the service of any and all of its citizens. This right of the 
public, however, must in some measure be qualified by the 
fitness and ability of the person whose services may be de- 
manded for the station designed, and the propriety of his ac- 
cepting the trust can only be properly determined when all 
his relations, social and political, are taken into the account. 
Of the former, I am ready to concede that the public must be 
the proper and only judge. In regard to the latter, the indi- 
vidual himself has a right to be consulted. These notices of 
the public press are from such sources, and so flattering, as to 
leave no doubt either of the sincerity or friendship of the 
authors. And the office itself, in my estimation, is second in 
point of dignity, honor and responsibility only to that of 
President of the United States. When we reflect that it has 
been held by a Jay, a Tompkins, and a Clinton, who in the 
■ discharge of its various and responsible duties acquired a fame 
that has connected them with the history of our country, and 
rendered their names immortal, all must agree that its honors 
are sufficient to satisfy the most lofty ambition. For myself I 
can truly say that they are more than I ever aspired to. 

"Believing, as I now do, that whoever shall receive the 
nomination of the Whig convention for that distinguished 
station, will be elected, it is not from any {^prehension of 
defeat that I am disposed to decline its honors. But for 
reasons partly of a public, and partly of a private character, I 
have invariably expressed an unwillingness to become a candi- 
date for that nomination. This has been long known to most 
of my intimate friends, and to few better than to yourself. But 
a sense of delicacy, which all must appreciate, rendered me 
reluctant to make a more public declaration of my wishes on 
this 'subject at this time. It also occurred to me that some 
individuals, acting under a mistaken sense of my real motives, 



LETTER TO THUELOW WEED. 83 

mio-lit be led to reproacli me with being influenced in my 
course in this matter by the results of the Baltimore conven- 
tion. But when I saw from the public journals that many of 
my friends were committing themselves on this subject, and 
reflecting that no man from any apprehension of subjecting 
himself to unmerited censure, had a right to shrink from the 
performance of any duty, I felt that the candor and frankness 
due to my political friends would not sufi:er me longer to per- 
mit them to remain in doubt as to my wishes on this subject. 

"Permit me then to say that I do not desire to be con- 
sidered as a candidate for that office. So far as my reasons* 
for this determination are founded upon private considerations, 
it would be alike indelicate and obtrusive to present them to 
the public. But if these could be removed or overcome, there 
are others of a more public character that should, it appears 
to me, be equally conclusive. 

*'In the first place, 1 greatly distrust my own ability to 
discharge the varied and complicated duties of that high sta- 
tion in a manner either creditable to myself or satisfactory to 
the pubhc. . For the last twelve years my attention has been 
mostly withdrawn from questions affecting State policy, and 
directed to national affairs. My chief experience in public 
matters has been in the national councils, and to my labors 
there I am mainly indebted for whatever reputation I may 
enjoy as a public man. It appears to me that the present 
peculiarly trying emergencies in the great interests of the 
State require a man for the executive chair of eminent 
ability, long tried experience, and a greater share of public 
confidence than 1 can hope to possess. I can not but feel 
that many who have been mentioned are more deserving of 
that honor, and better able to discharge those high trusts, 
than myself. I recognize in each "an elder and a better 
soldier." 

" But secondly, it is known to all that T have recently been 
a candidate for nomination to the Vice-presidency. I had 
previously considered my political career as ended for the 
i.Vesent, if not closed forever. Never at all sanguine of suc- 
cess, I yielded a reluctant assent to the presentation of my 
name for that office. Grateful as I am, and ev^r shall be, 
for the generous devotion of my friends, I felt no disappoint- 
ment in the result, and unite mgst cordially with my Whig 



84 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

bretliren in sustaining the excellent nominations of that con- 
vention. But a candidate is now t5 be selected from the Whig 
party of this State for the gubernatorial office. Such person 
must be taken from among my political associates, and I feel 
that I owe too much to them to suffer my name to come in 
competition with theirs for this distinguished honor. To per- 
mit it would wear the semblance of ingratitude, or an over- 
weening ambition for political preferment. I know that I feel 
neither, and I can perceive no reason why I should subject 
myself to the imputation. This alone, if there were no other 
reasons, would be to my mind an insuperable objection. 

" But, nevertheless, while I thus decline to be considered a 
candidate for nomination, it is due to myself to express the 
grateful emotions of my heart to those friends who have so 
kindly intimated a pi-eference for me for that office. It implies 
a confidence on their part which it has been the height of my 
ambition to acquire ; and I shall cherish the recollection of it 
through life. Believe me, also, when I say that I am not 
insensible to the deep obligations which I am under to the 
people of this, my native State; and more especially to those 
in the western part of it, who have sustained me with such 
generous devotion and unwavering fidelity through many 
year's of arduous public service. They could not call upon 
me for any sacrifice, merely personal to myself, that I should 
not feel bound to make. I owe them a debt of gratitude 
which I never expect to be able to discharge. But the Whig- 
party of this State now presents an array of talent and of well 
tried political and moral integrity not excelled by that of any 
other State in the Union. From this distinguished host it 
can not be difficult to select a suitable candidate for the office 
of Governor — one who is capable, faithful, true to the cause 
and the country, and who will call out the enthusiastic support 
of the whole Whig party. To such a candidate I pledge in 
advance my most hearty and zealous support. • Let us add 
his name to those of Clay and Frelinghuysen, and our success 
is certain. 

"But while I thus withdraw from competition for the honors, 
be assured that I do not shrink from the labors or responsi- 
bilities of this great contest. We have a work to perform in 
this State which calls for the united effort and untiring exer- 
tion of every true Whig. Here the great battle is to be 



CANDIDATE FOK GOVEKNOE. 85 

fought. For myself I am enlisted for the war. Wherever I 
can be of most service, there I am willing to go ; I seek no dis- 
tinction but such as may be acquired by a faithful laborer in 
a good cause. I ask no reward but such as results to all from 
a good government well administered ; and ^I desire no higher 
gratification than to witness the well merited honors with 
which victory will crown my numerous Whig friends. 
" 1 am truly yours, 

"Millard Fillmore." 



Whatever force there may have been in the reasons assigned 
in this letter, the current of Whig feeling was running too 
strongly in favor of Mr. Fillmore's nomination for Governor, to 
be arrested by any expression of his wishes. Whatever might 
be the merits of other distinguished Whigs, the party was 
united on him, and the movement was so spontaneous, that it 
was feared an attempt to make any other nomination would 
distract and embarrass the party. The unanimous voice of 
the Whig press insisted that it was the duty of Mr. Fillmore 
to yield his private inclinations, and of the party to nominate 
him with the same unanimity they would have done had he 
not publicly declined the honor. 

The Whig State convention met on the eleventh of Sep- 
tember, and Hon. Francis Granger, formerly Postmaster 
General, was chosen president. As soon as the organization 
was completed, a delegate from Onondaga county, after a few 
prefatory remarks, moved a resolution declaring Millard Fill- 
more unanimously nominated as the Whig candidate for 
Governor. The president having put the question, the reso- 
lution was carried by acclamation, the convention and spec- 
tators rising in a body and giving nine enthusiastic cheers. 
Thus the Whigs of New York, too impatient to testify their 
confidence in the man of their choice to await the formality of 
a ballot, promptly made him their candidate with an enthusiasm 
so spontimeo'us, a zeal so irrepressible, as to compel his 



8# BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

acceptance of th^ nomination. We copy two of the resolu- 
tions which were unanimously adopted by the convention : 

^'Resolved, That we announce to the people of this great 
commonwealth, with peculiar and triumphant satisfaction, the 
name of our candidate for the chief magistracy of the State — 
a nomination which we were called together not to suggest 
but to declare, as the previously expressed will of the people — 
a nomination which we have therefore made unanimously 
without a moment's delay, and without a thought of dissent — 
and that we rejoice in the opportunity thus to show a grateful 
people's high appreciation of the modest worth, the manly public 
virtue, the spotless integrity and unchangeable fidelity of that 
eminent champion of Whig principles, the dauntless vindicator 
of the outraged popular sufifrage in the case of the insulted 
'BROAD SEAL°of Ncw Jcrsey in 1840, the vahant and victori- 
ous leader of the patriotic' Whigs of the immortal twenty- 
seventh Congress in their long and trying warfare against 
corruption and despotism, the laborious author and eloquent 
defender of the Whig Tariff — Millard Fillmore. 

''Resolved, That in him, known to the people by long and 
faithful service in the Legislature of the State and nation, 
we rejoice to present a true and worthy representative of 
Democratic Republican principles, born in the forest of the 
noble western region of our own State, trained among an 
industrious kindred to hardy toil and manual labor on the 
farm and in the manufactory — democratic in all his associations 
and sympathies — called early into honorable public service, 
and promoted to an unsought distinction by an intelligent con- 
stituency, who learned his capacity by experience — free from 
the degrading and contaminating association of partisan man- 
agers and ' spoilers ' — one who never sought to rob the people 
of the right to choose their own rulers, but ever distinguished 
himself in contending for popular rights and constitutional 
liberty, and in securing to the American laborer his labor's 
just and high reward." 

It is a well known matter of history, that in the presidential 
campaign of 1844, the Whig party were disastrously beaten. 
They had entered the canvass with high and confident hopes 



LETTEK TO MR. CLAY. ^ 

of success, and deep and bitter was tteir disappointment, when 
they found that Henry Clay, their great and cherished leader, 
was defeated by a majority of sixty-six electoral votes. Mr. 
Fillmore, of course, shared the defeat of his party. Person- 
ally, his failure to be elected Governor of New York was a 
relief, for he had not wanted the officp. But he felt, with the 
whole Whig party, the sorest disappointment and chagrin that 
the most illustrious statesman in the country should have been 
vanquished in a contest before the people, by a man of the 
moderate pretensions of his Democratic competitor. Under the 
influence of these feelings, Mr. Fillmore wrote the following 
letter to Mr. Clay, in which he justly attributed his defeat in 
the State of New York to the Abolitionists and foreign 
Catholics: 

Buffalo, November 11th, 1844. 

"Mr Dear Sir: I have thought for three or four days that 
I would write you, but really I am unmanned. I have no 
courage or resolution. All is gone. The last hope, which 
hung first upon the city of New York and then upon Virginia, 
is finally dissipated, and I see nothing but despair depicted on 
every countenance. 

" For myself I have no regrets. I was nominated much 
against my will, and though not insensible to the pride of suc- 
cess, yet 1 feel a kind of relief at being defeated. But not so 
for you or for the nation. Every consideration of justice, every 
feeling of gratitude conspired in the minds of honest men to 
insure your election ; and though always doubtful of my own 
success, I could never doubt yours, till the painful conviction 
was forced upon me. 

"The Abolitionists and foreign Catholics have defeated us 
in this State. I will not trust myself to speak of the vile hy- 
pocrisy of the leading Abolitionists now. Doubtless many 
acted honestly but ignorantly in what they did. But it is clear 
that Birney and his associates sold themselves to Locofocoism, 
and they will doubtless receive their reward. 

" Our opponents, by pointing to the Native Americans and 
to Mr. Frelinghuysen, drove the foreign Catholics from us and 
defeated us in this State. 



88 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

" But it is vain to look at the causes by which this infamous 
result has been produced. It is enough to say that alt is gone, 
and I must confess that nothing has happened to shake my 
confidence in our ability to sustain a free government so much 
as this. If with such issues and such candidates as the na- 
tional contest presented, we can be beaten, what may we not 
expect ? A cloud of gloom hangs over the future. May God 
save the country; for it is evident the people will not." 

Mr. Fillmore was not alone in supposing that its foreign 
population had deprived the country of the services of a states- 
man pre-eminently fitted for its highest office, whose elevation 
to the presidency would have been a matter of just national 
pride. To show how widely this impression prevailed among 
intelligent men, we make the following quotations from some 
of the numerous letters addressed to Mr. Clay after the result 
of the election became known. 

The venerable Ambrose Spencer, formerly Chief Justice of 
the Supreme Court of the State of New York, wrote to Mr. 
Clay as follows, under the date of Albany, Nov. 21&t, 1844: 

"You will perceive that the Abolition vote lost you the 
election, as three-fourths of them were firm Whigs, converted 
into Abolitionists. The foreign vote also destroyed your elec- 
tion, and there was yet another distinct cause. * * "s^ * 
This untoward event has produced universal gloom, and has 
shaken pubHc confidence to an unexpected extent. Even 
many of those who voted for Polk, now that he is elected, 
deeply regret the result. God only knows to what we are 
destined. One sentiment seems to prevail universally, that 
the naturalization laws must be altered ; that they must be re- 
pealed, and the door forever shut on the admission of foreigners 
to citizenship, or that they undergo a long probation. I am 
for the former. 

" The Germans and the Irish are in the same category ; the 
one who know not our language, and are as ignorant as • the 
lazzaroni of Italy, can never understandingly exercise the fran- 
chise; and the other, besides their ignorance, are naturally 
inclined to go with the loafers of our own population." 



FOREIGN POLITICAL INFLUENCE. 89 

Philip Hone, of New York city, under date of Nov. 28tli, 
1844, writes: 

" But the especial object of my writing is to remove any 
unfavorable impressions (if such there be) from your mind as 
to the miserable result here. The loss of New York was fatal 
to the cause of the Whigs, but I pray you, dear sir, to attri- 
bute no part of this misfortune to a want of exertion on the 
part of your friends in the city of New York. Never before 
did they work so faithfully, and never, I fear, will they again ; 
the man and the cause were equally dear to the noble Whigs, 
and every honorable exertion was made, every personal sacri- 
fice submitted to, every liberal oblation poured upon the altar 
of patriotic devotion; nine-tenths of our respectable citizens 
voted for Clay and Frelinghuysen — the merchants, the profes- 
sional men, the mechanics and working men, all such as live by 
their skill and the labor of their honest hands, who have wives 
whom they cherish and children whom they strive to educate 
and make good citizens — men who go to church on Sundays, 
respect the laws and love their country — such men, to the 
number of twenty-six thousand three hundred and eighty-five, 
redeemed their pledge to God and the country; but alas! 
the numerical strength lies not in those classes. Foreigners 
who have 'no lot or inheritance' in the matter, have robbed us 
of our birth-right, the * scepter has departed from Israel.' Ire- 
land has re-conquered the country which England lost, but 
never suflfer yourself to believe that a single trace of the name 
of Henry Clay is obliterated from the swelling hearts of the 
Whigs of New York." 

The following is extracted from a letter to Mr. Clay, written 
by John H. Westwood, dated Baltimore, Nov. 28th, 1844: 

" I well recollect in the family circle, while a boy, sitting 
around the domestic hearth, hearing my father recount your 
patriotic deeds. One sentence from a speech of yours, ' The 
colors that float from the mast-head should be the credentials 
of our seamen,' was indelibly fixed on my muid. Then judge 
my deep mortification and disappointment t,p find the sailors' 
friend, the master-spirit of the late war, 'the noblest Roman 
of them all,' rejected by the American people, and such a man 



90 BIOGEAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

as James K. Polk placed in the presidential chair. Did I say 
American people ? I recall that expression, for two-thirds of 
the native freemen of the United States are your fast friends. 
" It was foreign influence aided by the Irish and Dutch vote 
that caused our defeat. As a proof, in my native city alone, 
in the short space of two months there were over one thousand 
naturalized. Out of this number nine-tenths voted the Loco- 
foco ticket. Thus men who could not speak our language were 
made citizens and became politicians too, who at the polls were 
the noisy revilers of your fair fame. Thus you have been well 
rewarded for the interest you ever took for the oppressed of 
other nations. Notwithstanding the ingratitude of the Irish 
and German voters, if the Abolitionists of New York had done 
their duty, all would have been well." 

Mr. E. Pettigru, of Magnolia, North Carolina, wrote a letter 
to Mr. Clay on the occasion of his defeat, from which the fol- 
lowing is an extract : 

"But on this subject I need say no more. It is all plain to 
you, and my remarks are only to show how much I deplore 
the failure of our forefathers, the patriots of the Revolution. 
But one word on the subject of naturalization. My opinion 
has been for forty years that there should be no citizens of the 
United States except those born within its limits. Let every 
foreigner be satisfied to enjoy all the other privileges that the 
State in which they chose to live thought proper to grant. 
Had that been the law, we should not now be like men in a 
thunder squall waiting, with trembling anxiety for the next clap." 

Mr. C. L. L. Leary, of Baltimore, under the date of Nov. 
14th, 1844, writes: 

" I console myself, too, (and to you it must be a source of 
unfailing gratulation,) that I find myself arrayed in this contest 
on the same side with the enlightened intelligence, virtue, and 
patriotism of the Union, with the line of discrimination so 
broadly and vividly drawn, that *the wayfaring man,' though 
a fool in other matters, 'need not err therein.' Whatever 
partial triumphs we have won, have been achieved by honest 
American hearts, and with unstained American hands ; no levies 



aim OF THE AMERICAN PARTY. 91 

have been made upon the prisons and lazar-houses of Europe ; 
no Canadian mercenaries or Hessian auxiliaries have been 
either pressed or purchased into our service ; you are the only 
choice of the great American party, standing upon a broad 
American platform, supported and dependent upon an Ameri- 
can Constitution, as framed, understood, and construed by the 
patriot fathers of the republic. We are told in Holy Writ 
that 'The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are 
exalted;' and in this humiliating posture we now find American 
afifairs. The very fountain of our political system, from whence 
all authority and power flow, is revoltingly corrupt. The bal- 
lot-box is poisoned by gross ignorance and wanton perjury.'* 

Mr. Frehnghuysen, who was candidate for Vice-president on 
the same ticket with Mr. Clay, says to him in a letter written 
from New York, Nov. 11th, 1844: 

" And then the foreign vote was tremendous. More than 
three thousand, it is confidently said, have been naturalized in 
this city alone since the first of October. It is an alarming 
fact, that this foreign vote has decided the great questions of 
American policy, and counteracted a nation's gratitude." 

We have made these numerous extracts for the purpose of 
showing how deep, pervading and wide-spread was the impres- 
sion, among intelligent men in all parts of the country, in 1844, 
that our foreign population had come to exert a very undue 
influence in American politics. They show that the feeling out 
of which the present American party has sprung is no hasty im 
pulse, no sudden freak, no transient ebullition of passion, but a 
deeply seated conviction of the American mind, which has 
been growing and gathering strength for years. As it has not 
suddenly sprung up, so it will not rapidly disappear 

The quotations we have just made suggest the propriety of 
our giving, in this connection, a slight sketch of the first rise 
of the American party as a distinct political organization. 

In the year 1834, Professor Samuel B. Morse, the inventor 
of the electro-magnetic telegraph, a gentleman whose fame 



92 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

will be as enduring as the records of science,was run as a candi- 
date for mayor of New York city, by a party which had just 
been organized for the purpose of withstanding foreign influ- 
ence in our elections. He received nine thousand votes. An 
address had previously been issued, which temperately but 
ably set forth the dangers which threatened our institutions 
from the abuse of the elective franchise, by the foreign popula- 
tion of the country, the convenient instruments of papal priests 
and native demagogues. The truths presented in this address 
w^ere so forcible that they produced a powerful impression, led 
to a distinctive American organization, and the nomination of a 
purely American ticket. The vote polled in its favor seemed 
so indicative of future success, that it excited the apprehen- 
sions of the old parties, whose leaders then controlled the po- 
litical press. They opened their batteries against the rising 
party, and by the power of the press and the efficiency of party 
discipline, succeeded in repressing temporarily the outward 
expression of a sentiment which, though it might be checked, 
could not be extinguished. 

The mention of Professor Morse recalls an incident, which 
as it connects his name with that of Mr. Fillmore, we will 
briefly relate : 

When Professor Morse had perfected his electric telegraph 
and secured the patent, its exhibition in Washington excited 
much attention. Mr. Fillmore, then chairman of the com- 
mittee of ways and means, was particularly interested in the 
novel and extraordinary machine, and after making up the de- 
tails of the annual civil appropriation bill, he proposed an 
amendment appropriating $30,000 for the construction of an 
electric telegraph from Washington to Baltimore. A distin- 
guished member of the House, who was afterward Post- 
master General, violently opposed the appropriation, and, in the 
excitement of the debate, denounced the invention as a worth- 
less humbug. By the urgent and impressive representations 



RISE OF THE AMERICAN PARTY. 93 

of Mr. Fillmore the amendment was carried, when the gen- 
tleman referred to, as a mode of expressing his derision, 
rose in his place and proposed as a further amendment, an 
appropriation of sixty thousand dollars to carry on experiments 
in animal magnetism, as a doubly important and much more ra- 
tional object. But in spite of sneers and jibes, Mr. Fillmore 
carried his point, and this great American invention was ena- 
bled to give a practical demonstration of its utility. 

Although the American party of 1834 did not maintain its 
organization, the occurrences of subsequent years deepened the 
conviction of its necessity. Not only did the same corrupt in- 
fluences which it had tried to stem continue to prevail in the elec- 
tions, but the papal hierarchy seemed to have made a conquest 
of the Governor of New York. In 1840, Gov. Seward proposed 
to the Legislature of the State to innovate upon its school sys- 
tem, by setting apart a portion of its common school fund for the 
support of sectarian schools, under the control of the Catholic 
church. This project, warmly advocated by Bishop Hughes, 
was again obtruded on the New York Legislature by Gov. 
Seward in 1841, and pressed with all the arguments that 
could be devised in its favor by an artful and ingenious mind. 
Events like these, combined with the constantly inci-easiqg in- 
solence of foreign voters and office-seekers, deepened the re- 
pugnance of American citizens, and led to a revival of the 
American party as a distinct political organization. The for- 
eign residents in the large cities had not only become numer- 
ous, but they exerted a large influence in the elections in 
proportion to their numbers. They held the balance of power 
between the two old parties, and were conscious that they 
could turn the scale whichever way they pleased. Presuming 
on their strength, they demanded and received a large share 
of the less important offices, to the exclusion of native born cit- 
izens. The services for which they were thus rewarded con- 
sisted in thronging caucuses and primary meetings, and so 



94 BIOGBAPHY OF MILLABD IlLLMOKE. 

ft 
degrading their character that self-respecting men would take 
no part in managing the machinery by which nominations 
were controlled; and in hanging about the polls and bullying 
^uiet native citizens who went to deposit their votes. 

These abuses led to the re-organization of the American party 
in 1843. A declaration of principles was published, and in the 
city of New York a full municipal ticket was nominated which 
polled a very considerable vote. Boston, Philadelphia, St. Louis, 
New Orleans, and other cities followed the patriotic example, 
and each of them elected either the whole or a part of the 
American ticket. In the municipal election in New York city 
in April, 1844, the Native American party nominated James 
Harper, of the respectable publishing firm of Harper & Broth- 
ers, as their candidate for mayor, and elected him by a ma- 
jority of between four and five thousand. They also elected 
a majority of the aldermen and assistant aldermen of the city. 

The American feeling which gave these powerful evidences 
of its strength in nearly all our large cities in 1844, was again 
smothered, as it had been ten years before. True, it was much 
-deeper and more general than it had been in 1834, but be- 
sides the disciphne of political parties which was put in requi- 
sition to crush it, it encountered obstacles in the absorbing top- 
ics which then engrossed public attention. The next year Texas 
was annexed to the United States.^ Then followed the war 
with Mexico, large acquisitions of new territory, the discovery 
of the rich gold mines of California, and the exciting contro- 
versies consequent on the appUcation of that rapidly matured 
State for admission into the federal union. But no sooner had 
the pubUc mind time to settle into tranquillity after the excite- 
ment which attended the adoption of the compromise of 1850, 
than American sentiments again ibund expression, and asserted 
their power as they had never done before. As, in 1844, 
they had shown themselves much more powerful than in 1834, 
so, in 1854, all preceding exhibitions of American feeling seemed 



THE AMERICAN PARTY. 95 

but as tlie drops which precede a copious and refreshing 
shower. Although by the repeal of the Missouri compromise, 
the country has been afflicted with another distracting slavery 
agitation, even that has been unable to arrest or materially re- 
tard the progress of Americanism, and however the movement 
may be obstructed or opposed, it will triumph over all obsta- 
cles, because it is founded in the deepest feelings of millions of 
patriotic hearts. 



96 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 



CHAPTER VI. 

ELECTED COMPTROLLER OF NEW YORK. 

In the fall of 1847, Mr. Fillmore was elected Coiriptroller of 
the State of New York, and entered on the duties of the office on 
the first of the following January. This office is one of great 
importance, the Comptroller being the chief financial officer of 
the State, and entrusted with the management of all its various 
funds. These, in the State of New York, are numerous and 
large, some half dozen distinct and separate funds being enu- 
merated, and their condition regularly described, in the annual 
reports required of the Comptroller. To say nothing of the 
school funds which amount to between two and three millions of 
dollars, or the United States deposit fund, amounting to between 
four and five millions, or the literature fund, or the trust funds, 
the magnificent and almost gigantic system of public works 
which are the property of the State, would alone require that 
its principal financial officer should be a man of great business 
capacity, experience and skill. At the time Mr. Fillmore held 
the office, in addition to his other multifarious duties, the Comp- 
troller was superintendent of the bank department in the 
wealthiest and the most commercial State in the Union, as well 
as a leading member of the Canal Board. As the citizens of 
other States have probably a very inadequate conception of the 
importance of this office, and the high order of ability requisite 
for the successful discharge of its duties, it may not be amiss 
to copy the following paragraphs which appeared in the Albany 
Argus the year previous to Mr. Fillmore's election as Comp- 



COMPTEOLLEESIIIP OF NEW YORK. " 97 

trollcr. They are quoted from an article ^Yritten by an able 
and highly intelligent currespondent of that paper: 

"There is at tliis day no officer of the State whose duties 
and powers are so diversified, so extensive, and so comphcated, 
as those of the Comptroller ; nor is there any who is placed in 
a more commanding position for exercising a pohtical influence. 
From a simple auditor of accounts, and a watch upon the treas- 
ury, he has sprung up into an officer of the first eminence in 
the administration ; supplanting by degrees some departments 
wliich were once in equal, if not higher regard, as auxiliaries 
and advisees of the executive power. He is the one-man of 
the government. He is not simply an oflicer, but a bundle 
of officers. There is hardly a branch of the administration of 
which he is not a prominent member; so prominent, in some 
cases, that the affairs of that branch can not be conducted with- 
out his actual presence, although personally lie may be a mi- 
nority of those having it in charge. He is the chief of the 
finances; the superintendent of banks; and the virtual quo- 
rum of the commissioners of the canal fund, with all the power 
which such a position gives him in the Canal Board. While 
other State departments have no^nore than maintained their 
original sphere and authority, or have suffered material dimin- 
ution, particularly of influence, the office of Comptroller has 
been a favorite of the Legislature, and the chief object of it^ 
confidence, entrusted with high if not extraordinary powers of 
government. An examination of the statutes wiU show that 
every year adds to its duties, until they have become, by contin- 
ual aggregation, a complicated mass, beyond the power of 
performance by any one man, and almost beyond the reach of 
his thorough and intelligent supervision." 

"To form an adequate idea of the mass of duty he has in 
charge, it is necessary not only to survey the summary contained 
in the revised code of our laws, but to trace out the statutes 
5 



98 EIOGKAPHY OP MH.LAKD FILLMOKE. 

from year to year; to review the reports of his office; and to 
follow him and his numerous assistants in the actual discharge 
of their various labors in the financial, banking, and tax bu- 
reaux of his department. But it is inconsistent with the de- 
signed brevity of these papers to enter into the details which 
alone can convey a suitable notion of the magnitude and respon- 
sibihty of his trust and influence. As the department is now 
organized, it is overgrown and cumbersome ; and to perform 
with thorough intelligence and conscientiousness, without error 
or delay, all its requisite offices of supervision and of action, 
requires the sight of Argus, with his hundred eyes, and the 
activity of Briareus, with his hundred hands." 

Mr. Fillmore's talents peculiarly fitted him for the able 
discharge of the duties of this office — duties even more import- 
ant than those of the Governor of the State, and more compli- 
cated than any which devolve on the secretary of the national 
treasury. He possesses in a very high degree the combina- 
tion of qualities which consdtute eminent administrative ability. 
A native cast of mind which prefers business to show, love of 
labor, fondness for method, a comprehensive mental grasp 
united to great capacity for details, energy, inventiveness — these 
are qualities for w'hich Mr. Fillmore is distinguished, and which 
form the solid basis on which his reputation as an executive 
officer has been reared. In mentioning inventiveness as one 
of his mental characteristics, we must not be understood t6 
mean that light play of fancy which supplies imagery to the 
poet; for Mr. Fillmore's turn of thought is too earnest and 
manly to feel much pleasure in frivolous ornaments. He is a 
greater master of the figures of arithmetic than of the figures of 
rhetoric; but the mathematician maybe original as well as the 
orator, although it requires more skill to discern and appreciate 
the originality of the former than of the latter. It is the 
business of the statesman to deal with grave and important in- 
terests, and if he is a man of great resources he shows it rather 



99 

by proposing wise measures which will abide the test of time, 
than by making ingenious speeches that die with the breath 
that utters them. When Hamilton devised the financial sys- 
tem by which the country was extricated from its difficulties 
and retrieved its ruined credit, he was as much entitled to the 
praise of originality as was John Randolph in any of those ec- 
centricities of thought which rendered his speeches so entertain- 
ing. The kind of inventiveness by which a statesman becomes 
fertile in resources, is not that which kindles into brilliant 
coruscations in popular oratory, but that which enables him 
to bring to great exigencies the measures best adapted to meet 
them. In 1842, the national finances were in a most deplor- 
able condition. Millard Fillmore was made chairman of the 
committee of ways and means, and when he had matured his 
measures of relief, credit revived and the country entered on a 
new career of prosperity. In 1850, sectional controversies ran 
so high as to imperil the existence of the Union; Millard Fill- 
more became President of the United States, and harmony and 
tranquillity were perfectly restored. 

These remarks in relation to the originality of Mr. Fillmore's 
mind have been suggested by his report as Comptroller of New 
York. The merits one would expect to find "in such a docu- 
ment are a clear exhibit of the financial condition of the com- 
monwealth and of the state of its various funds, accompanied, 
perhaps, by suggestions relative to their management. Not 
only did Mr. Fillmore's report possess these merits ; not only 
did it display clear method, lucid statement and happy sug- 
gestions, but it proposed a plan for improving the banking- 
system of the State, which embodied the happitist solution that 
has ever been ofifered of the great problem of devising a circu- 
lating medium which should combine the lightness and conve- 
nience of paper with the security of gold and silver. We 
quote from his report all that he said on the subject of banks, 
asking particular attention to the part which recommends 



100 BIOGKAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

United States stocks as a basis of banking. The reader wiU 
be struck with the comprehensiveness of view which so readily 
combines a measure of State policy with a method for facilitat- 
ing the collection of the national revenues. The plan pro- 
posed by Mr. Fillmore would unite the advantages claimed for 
both a United States Bank and the sub-treasury system, with- 
out the dangers and inconveniences of either ; 

o 

" In order to determine this question properly, several things 
ai*e to be taken into consideration, and the first is, what is the 
duty of the State in reference to banking? It would, doubt- 
less, be desirable to create banks which should be able to dis- 
charge every obligation, not only to the bill-holder, but to the 
depositors, and all others to whom it should incur any liability. 
But this is impossible. The safety fund, which was intended 
to provide such security, would have been ample to redeem 
all the circulation of the banks which have failed, but it has 
been exhausted in paying depositors and other creditors of the 
insolvent banks, and is now mortgaged for all it will probably 
produce for eighteen years to come. Thus by attempting 
more than could be accomplished, the Legislature failed to 
secure the bill-holder, which was in its power, and, for the 
remaining eighteen years that some of these charters have to 
run, the safety fund yields him no security. It is apparent, 
then, that security for all liabilities can not be provided, and 
the State is under no more obligation to attempt this impossi- 
bility than it would be the equally "?ibsurd one of making every 
merchant capable of meeting all the obligations he should incur. 

" It is humbly conceived the duty of the State in this case 
begins and ends with furnishing a good and safe currency to 
the people. To furnish this currency, so far as it consists of 
paper or credit, is an exclusive privilege granted by the State, 
and the State should take care that in granting it the people 
are secured from imposition and loss. Any man may receive 
deposits, or discount a note, or loan money, or draw a bill of 
exchange. 

'• These, it is admitted, are banking operations. But they 
are open to all. Those who engage in them enjoy no exclu- 
sive privilege. But not so with those who are authorized to 



BANKS AND BANKING. 101 

issue bank notes to circulate as mone3\ This is a banking op- 
eration confined to the few. It is a prerogative enjoj^ed exclu- 
siv^ely by the money kings of the country, and they should not 
onjoy it without giving the most ample securiLy. This duty is 
justly imposed for the privilege which is granted. 

" Assuming, then, that the great object of legislation on this 
subject is to provide a sound currency by giving ample security 
to the bill-holder, the question is, how can this best be accom- 
plished? It must be borne in mind that safety fund banks 
derive much of their credit from the individuals who were in- 
corporated. By granting a special charter in each case, the 
Legislature had it in its power in some measure to control this 
matter. 

" But there was an attendant evil that in the opinion of many 
outweighed the good. The practice of granting exclusive priv- 
ileges to particular individuals invited competition for these 
legislative favors. They were soon regarded as part of the 
spoils belonging to the victorious party, and were dealt out as 
rewards for pai'tisan services. 

"This practice became so shameless and corrupt that it could 
be endured no longer, and in 1838 the legislature sought a 
remedy in the general banking law. This was the origin of 
the free bank system. Since that time no safety fund bank 
has been chartered; and in 1846 the people set their seal of 
reprobation upon this practice of granting special charters for 
banks, by providing in the new constitution that 'the Legisla- 
ture should have no power to pass any act granting any special 
charter for banking purposes, but that corporations or associa- 
tions might be formed for such purposes under general laws.' 
"Would it be safe, then, to provide by general law that 
voluntary associations or incorporations might be formed any 
where and by any persons for banking? The Comptroller 
thinks not. Suppose they were required to pay in all their 
capital, and the most satisfactory proof should be required of 
this fEict. Even this is no security to the bill-holder. The 
capital paid in is left in the custody of those who pay it. They 
can withdraw it at pleasure. It would only be necessary for 
those who wished to practice a fraud upon the credulity of the 
communit}^, and reap a golden harvest, to associate together 
and form a bank, pay in a large capital, appoint one of their 
associates president, and another cashier, to take charge of it ; 



102 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

prove to this department these facts, and obtain bills for circu- 
lation to an equal amount, and then pay them out for property 
easily transported — take their capital and leave for California, 
and in one week would be beyond the reach of process or the 
powQr of coercion. 

" But it has been suggested that each bank might be re- 
quired to deposit a certain amount, say ten per cent., in the 
treasury, to constitute a fund for the redemption of its bills. 
So far as this deposit goes it may be safe. It is on the princi- 
ple of the free bank system. But if the deposit be intended 
for the redemption of the bank only which makes the deposit, 
it is wholly inadequate. It is no more than the banks under 
the old safety fund system paid to a general fund. Their 
charters had twenty years to run. They paid half of one per 
cent, per annum, making in all ten per cent. To say that one 
dollar is deposited as a security for the redemption of ten, is 
a mockery. 

" But it may be said that the tills constitute a common fund 
for the redemption of the bills of the insolvent banks only. 
Then, as many which are solvent will not want it, there will 
be enough to redeem all the bills of those which shall prove 
insolvent. This is doubted. This fund, instead of being 
sufficient to redeem the notes of all 'insolvent banks, would 
probably for a time give just credit enough to the fraudulent 
associations which would be formed, to enable them to get 
their notes in circulation, and then by withdrawing their capi- 
tal the more effectually defraud the community. It is believed 
to be wholly inadequate for the object intended. 

" The Comptroller believes that the safest way to make a 
sound paper currency, is to have at all times ample security 
for its redemption in the possession of the State. In order to 
make this security ample, it should be not only sufficient in 
amount, but should be of such a nature that it may be readily 
converted into cash without loss. It is not enough that the 
security be ultimately good or collectable; delay in redeeming 
the circulation causes it to depreciate, and is almost as fatal to 
the poor man who can not wait, as ultimate insolvency. He 
becomes at once the victim of the broker. 

" A bond and mortgage may be good — that is, the whole 
amount secured by them may be collectable. But the bill- 
holder can not wait for this. They must be convertible into 



BANKING-. 106 

cash by sale, and if for any reason this can not be promptly 
done, tiiey are not of that kind of security which should be 
required. All the experience of this department shows that 
bonds and mortgages are not the best security for this purpose, 
and while better security can be had, it is deeply to be regret- 
ted that they were ever received. The apprehension that 
there may be a defect of title, that the lands mortgaged may 
have been appraised too high, or that there ma}' be some legal 
defense to a suit of foreclosure, all conspire to depreciate their 
value in the estimation of purchasers, when offered for sale at 
auction on the failure of a bank. 

" Capitalists are cautious about purchasing, and the conse- 
quence is. that they have sometimes sold for less ihan twenty 
per cent, on the amount received by them, and the average 
amount for which all have been sold, for the last ten years, is 
only thirty-seven and seventy-one hundredths per cent., while 
the average amount for which the five per cent, stocks of this 
State have sold is ninety-two eighty-six one-hundredths per 
cent., or ninety-two dollars and eighty-six one-hundredths for 
every hundred dollars of stock. This shows that a six per 
cent, stock, such as is now required, would doubtless have sold 
at par, and the bill-holder would have received dollar for dol- 
lar for the circulation. 

" Should the country remain at peace, it can not be doubted 
that the stocks of the United States will be a safe and adequate 
security. The Comptroller w^ould therefore recommend that 
the law be so changed as to exclude bonds and mortgages 
from all free banks which shall hereafter commence business, 
and to prevent the taking of any more from those now in op- 
eration, and to require that ten per cent, per annum of those 
now held as security be withdrawn, and their places supplied 
by stocks of this State, or of the United States. If this re- 
commendation be adopted, at the end of ten years the whole 
security will be equal to a six per cent, stock of this State or 
of the United States, which it is presumed will be ample se- 
curity for the redemption of all bills in circulation. 

" Could this system of banking be generally adopted in the 
several States, it can hardly be doubted it would prove highly 
beneficial. It would create a demand for their own State 
stocks. The interest paid upon them would be paid to their 
own citizens. Every man wlio held a bank note, secured by 



104 . EIOGRAPHY OF JMILLAED FILLMORE. 

sucli stock, would have a direct interest in maintaining invio- 
late the credit of the State. The blasting cry of repuduition 
would never again be heard, and the plighted faith of the State 
would be as sacred as national honor; and lastly, it would give 
them a sound and uniform currency. 

"If, then, in addition to this. Congress would authorize such 
notes as were secured by stocks of the United States to be 
received for public, dues to the national treasury, this would 
give to such notes a universal credit, co-extensive wiih the 
United States, and leave nothing further to be desired in the 
shape of a national paper currency. This would avoid all ob- 
jection to a national bank, by obviating all necessity for one, 
for the purpose of furnishing a national currency. The na- 
tional government might be made amply secure. The law 
might provide that all bills secured by United States stock 
should be registered and countersigned in the treasury depart- 
ment, as the notes circulated by the banks in this State are 
registered and countersigned in this office. This would enable 
every collector, postmaster, or other receiver of public moneys, 
to know that they were receivable for public dues. 

" The stock of the United States by which their redemption 
was secured, might be so transferred to the State otJScer hold- 
ing the same, that it could not be sold or transferred by him 
without the assent of the secretary of the treasury, and in case 
of the failure of the bank to redeem its notes, it might be op- 
tional with the secretary of the treasury to exchange the notes 
held by the government for an equal amount of United States 
stock held for their redemption, or let it be sold and receive 
the government's share 'of the dividends. In this way the 
national government would always be secure against loss. 

" But this suo-o-estion is foreio-n from the chief object of this 
report, and is merely thrown out to invite attention to the sub- 
ject. But in conclusion, the Comptroller has no hesitation in 
recommending that the free bank system be moditied in the 
particulars above suggested, and that it be then adopted in 
preference to the safety fund system, as the banking system 
of this State. 

" It can not be supposed that the banking under this sys' 
tem will be as profitable as it has been under the safety fund 
system. It is therefore desirable that every facility should be 
given to capitalists who engage in it that can be granted con- 



RESIGNS THE COMPTROLLERSHIP. 105 

sistent with the security of the pubhc, and that no unreason- 
able or unjust system of taxation should be adopted which 
discriminates invidiously against them; but persons engaged 
in banking should be taxed like all other citizens." ' 

The report from which this extract is taken is the only one 
ever prepared by Mr. Fillmore as Comptroller of New York. 
Soon after its transmission to the Legislature, he resigned that 
office to enter upon his duties as Vice-president of the United 
States. 

5* 



106 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 



CHAPTER VII. 

VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 

In accepting the office of Comptroller, Mr. Fillmore had 
yielded to the urgent persuasions of his political friends at a 
considerable sacrifice of private interest. He was reluctant to 
relinquish a large and lucrative professional business, and, in con- 
senting to take the office, he determined that, on the expiration 
of his term, he would return to private life and devote himself 
to professional pursuits. When, therefore, he was solicited to 
allow his name to be presented to the Whig National Conven- 
tion, in 1848, as a candidate for Vice-president, he refused to 
entertain the proposal. 

Previous to the assembling of the Convention, -there existed, 
in the Whig party, great diversity of opinion as to who should 
be selected as candidate for President. A majority of the Whigs 
of New York, and several other States, were in favor of Mr. 
Clay; but the great personal popularity which always attends 
successful military exploits, seemed to render it expedient that 
the Whigs should select one of the two generals who had won 
great distinction in the war with Mexico. Besides his great 
military talents, Gen. Scott was supposed to possess such a 
knowledge of civil affairs as eminently fitted him to administer 
the government; and in fact, he had been a prominent Whig 
candidate previous to his brilliant achievements in the Mexican 
war. But the same objection which was urged against Mr. 
Clay, appHed, in some degree, to Gen. Scott. He too, had for 
many years been talked of in connection with the presidency. 



GEN. TATLOK. 107 

and was regarded by many in the light of an unsuccessful as- 
pirant. In deciding among the three, if eminent fitness for the 
office were to determine the choice, there could be no doubt 
that the nomination should be given to Mr. Clay, while the 
reasons founded on personal availability seemed to preponder- 
ate in favor of Gen. Taylor. He had won the earliest and 
some of the most brilliant victories in the Mexican war, and, 
though entirely destitute of civil experience, the people seemed 
impatient to testify their gratitude for his military services bv 
elevating him to the first office in the republic. In fact, he liad 
been spontaneously nominated, in various parts of the country, 
without any regard to his party connections, and before it was 
known in what direction his political sympathies leaned. The 
principal objecdon made to him by such Whigs as opposed his 
nomination, was that there was no evidence that he belonged 
to their party. Palo Alto, and Resaca de la Palma, and Mon- 
terey, and Buena Vista, were charmed names which would at- 
tract a host of supporters; but what evidence is there, inquired 
many anxious Whigs who were not insensible to Gen. Taylor's 
great personal strength, what evidence is there, that if elected 
by Whigs he would parry out Whig principles? The follow- 
ing letter, which found its wa)'- into the newspapers, had no 
tendency to remove their doubts : 

"Baton Rouge, La., January 80th, 1848. 

" Sir: Your communication of the 15th instant has been re- 
ceived, and the suggt^stions therein offered duly considered. 

" In reply to your inquiries, I have again to repeat, that I 
have neither the power nor the desire to dictate to the American 
people the exact manner in which they should proceed to nom- 
inate for the presidency of the United States. If they desire 
such a result, they must adopt the means best suited, in their 
opinion, to the consummation of the purpose; and if they think 
fit to bring me before them for this office, through their Legis- 
latures, mass meetings, or conventions, I can not object to 
their designating these bodies as Whig, Democrat, or Native. 



108 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

But in being thus nominated, I must insist on the condition — 
and my position on this point is immutable — that I shall not 
be brought forward by them as the candidate of their party, 
or considered as the exponent of their party doctrines. 

" In conclusion, I have to repeat, that if I were nominated 
for the presidency, by any body of my fellow-citizens, designa- 
ted by any aiame they might choose to adopt, I should esteem 
it an honor, and would accept such nomination, provided it bad 
been made entirely independent of party considerations. 
" I am, sir, very respectfully, 

" Your obedient servant, 

" Z. Taylor. 
" Peter Sken Smith, Esq., Philadelphia." 

A letter to Captain Allison, which he wrote three months 
later, did much to efface the impression which the one just 
quoted was calculated to produce, and so far satisfied a great 
portion of the Whigs, that General Taylor's name was promi- 
nently brought before the Whig Convention, which met at 
Philadelphia, »n the 1st of June, 1848. The portions of his 
Allison letter in which Gen. Taylor avowed his Whig principles 
are the following: 

" I will proceed, however, now to respond to your inquiries: — 
"1. I reiterate what I have so often said: 1 am a Whig. 
If elected, I would not be the mere president of a party. I 
would endeavor to act independent of party domination. I 
should feel bound to administer the government untrammeled 
by party schemes. 

"2. The Veto Power. — The power given by the constitution 
to the executive to interpose his veto, is a high conservative 
power; but, in my opinion, should never be exercised except 
in cases of clear violation of the constitution, or manifest haste 
and want of consideration by Congress. Indeed, I have 
thought that for many years past the known opinions and 
wishes of the executive have exercised undue and injurious in- 
tiuence upon the legislative department of the government; 
and for this cause 1 have thought that our system was ia 
danger of undergoing a great change from its true theory. 
The personal opinions of the individual who may happen to 



THE VETO POWEk. "* 109 

occupy the executive chair, ought not to control the action of 
Congress upon questions of domestic policy ; nor ought his ob- 
jections to be interposed where questions of constitutional 
power have been settled by the various departments of gov- 
ernment, and acquiesced in by the people. 

" 3. Upon the subject of the tariff, the currency, the im- 
provement of our great highways, rivers, lakes, and harbors, 
the will of the people as expressed through their representa- 
tives in Congress, ought to be respected and carried out by 
the executive." 

The principal feature of this avowal is the implied pledge 
that, if elected President, he would not thwart the wishes of 
Congress by the executive veto. The political history of the 
country, for the preceding thirty years, had led the Whigs to 
attach great importance to the views expressed by Gen. Taylor 
respecting^ the exercise of the veto power. Gen. Jackson's 
veto of the bill for rechartering the United States Bank, the 
veto of various internal improvement bills by Democratic pres- 
idents, and particularly the vetoes of President Tyler, which 
had stung them almost to madness, had caused the Whigs to 
array themselves against the exercise of the veto power by the 
national executive, except in cases of clear and palpable viola- 
lion of the constitution. A pledge not to defeat Whig meas- 
ures by a veto was therefore regarded as of more practical 
importance than any declaration of principles which a Whig 
candidate could make. Still there were many Whigs who pre- 
ferred the old and tried leaders, who had battled for their prin- 
ciples during a whole hfe-time. The first ballot taken in the 
Convention, while it showed the popularity of Gen. Taylor, 
disclosed, at the same time, a strong disposition to select some 
one of the veteran champions of the party. 

The vote stood, on the first ballot, as follows : For Zachary 
Taylor, one hundred and eleven; Henry Clay, ninety-seven; 
Winfield Scott, forty-three ; Daniel Webster, twenty-two; John 
M. Clayton, four; John M'Lean, two. Necessary for a choice, 



110 BIOGRAP^ OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

one hundred and forty; the whole number of votes being two 
hundred and seventy-nine. On the second ballot the vote stood 
for Taylor, one hundred and eighteen; Clay, eighty-six; Scott, 
forty-nine; Webster, twenty-two; Clayton, four. Third ballot, 
Taylor, one hundred and thirty-three; Clay, seventy-four; Scott, 
fifty-four; Webster, seventeen; Clayton, one. On the fourth 
and final ballot Taylor received one hundred and seventy-one 
votes, and was declared elected. 

This result had been anticipated from the beginning, but 
all except five or six of the delegates from New York, and the 
Whigs of that State in a still larger proportion, preferred Mr. 
Clay. The friends of Gen. Taylor were understood to favor 
the nomination of Abbott Lawrence, of Massachusetts, as Vice- 
president. Mr. Lawrence was a most estimable gentleman and 
true Whig, personally unobjectionable to any member of the 
party; but as he was known to have been a Taylor man from 
the beginning, it was thought that some other name on the 
ticket with Gen. Taylor would be more likely to insure his 
success. 

In this state of things some of the friends of Mr. Fillmore 
called on him, on their way to the convention, and solicited his 
permission to present his name as candidate for Vice-president. 
He made objections, and expressed his intention to retire to 
private life on the expiration of his term of ofiQce as Comp- 
troller. The representations of his friends were, however, so 
urgent as finally to draw from him a promise not to refuse in 
case he should be nominated. 

As soon as the fourth ballot, which, as we have seen, re- 
sulted in the nomination of Gen. Taylor, was over, and the 
cheering which greeted the announcement, both within and 
without the building, had partially subsided, Hon. John A. 
Collier, a State delegate from New York, and zealous Clay 
man, took the floor and made a brief speech, which was 
listened to with great attention. He did not conceal his 



LETTER OF ACCEPTANCE. Ill 

disappointment at a result be had done all in his power to de- 
feat, but declared that he would neither bolt the nomination him- 
self, nor countenance bolting in others. And, as a pledge of 
the good faith with which the friends of Mr. Clay in New York 
would support Gen. Taylor, he proposed the name of Millard 
Fillmore as the candidate for Vice-president. 

These remarks were received with unbounded applause, and, 
in a few minutes, the Convention proceeded to ballot. Of the 
two hundred and seventy-five votes cast on the first ballot, Mr. 
Fillmore had one hundred and fifteen, Mr. Lawrence one hun- 
dred and nine, and the rest were scattering. On the second 
ballot Mr. Fillmore received one hundred and seventy-three 
votes, (two more than had been given to Gen. Taylor,) and 
was declared nominated. 

To the letter of the president of the convention, informing 
him of his nomination, Mr. Fillmore made the following repl}^ : 

"Albany, N. Y., June 17th, 1848. 

*' Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your 
letter of the 10th inst., by which I am notified that at the late 
Whig Convention held at Philadelphia, Gen. Zachary Taylor 
was nominated for President and myself for Vice-president, and 
requesting m}' acceptance. 

'' The honor of being thus presented by the distinguished 
representatives of the Whig partj'^ of the Union for the second 
office in the gift of the people — an honor as unexpected as it 
was unsolicited — could not fail to awaken in a grateful heart 
emotions which, while they can not be suppre.ssed, find no 
appropriate language for utterance. 

" Fully persuaded that the cause in which we are enlisted is 
the cause of our country, that our chief object is to secure its 
peace, preserve its honor, and advance its prosperity; and feel- 
ing, moreover, a confident assurance that in Gen. Taylor (whose 
name is presented for the first office) I shall always find a firm 
and consistent Whig, a safe guide, and an honest man, I can not 
hesitate to assume any position which my friends may assign me. 

"Distrusting, as 1 well may, my ability to discharge satis- 
factorily the duties of that high office, but feeling that, in case 



112 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMORE, 

of my election, I may with safety repose upon the friendly aid 
of my fellow Whigs, and thnt efforts guided by honest inten- 
tions will always be charitably judged^ I accept the nomination 
so generously tendered, and I do this the more cheerfully, as 
I am willing, for such a cause and with such a man^ to take 
my chances of success or defeat, as the electors, the final arbi- 
ters of our fate, shall, in their wisdom, judge best for the 
interests of our common country. 

*' Please accept the assurance of nay high regard and esteem, 
and permit me to subscribe myself 

" Your friend and fellow-citizen, 

"Millard Fillmore. 

" Hon. J. M. MOREHEAD.'' 

The result of the presidential election which took place in 
November, 1848, was that Taylor and Fillmore received each 
one hundred and sixty-three electoral votes, against one hun- 
dred and twenty-seven votes given to Cass and Butler, the 
Democratic candidates for President and Vice-president. 

Mr. Fillmore happening to be in New York a few days after 
the result of the election became known, the Whig general 
committee, which was in session, waited on him in a body, and 
tendered him their congratulations on his election. Hon. 
Philip Hone, chairman of the general committee, addressed 
Mr. Fillmore as follows: 

** Sir : The Whig general committee wait upon you in a body 
to express the pleasure they feel, not only in the triumph of 
their principles, but a pleasure augmented by the agreeable 
fact that it elects you to the second office in the federal gov- 
ernment — you, a New York boy, born on our soil, a noble 
son of our. own institutions, who has made his own way ahead 
by his own industry, and energy, and devotion to correct, sound 
principles. It is known to you that the first choice of the 
general committee was not the illustrious man just elected 
President — for our hearts were pledged elsewhere — but for 
the position you are to hold, you were our first choice ; and 
whatever temporary disappointment we felt in the first result 
of the Philadelphia nominations, was immediately alleviated by 



RECEPTION IN NEW YORK. 113 

the agreeable intellig-ence that you were to share its fortunes 
and its honors. New York knew you. Your name was fa- 
miliar in our ears. You were the real favorite son of the 
State — and from the moment the ticket was formed, we gave 
to it our hearty, energetic, and undivided support. 

" Sir, in tendering you our congratulations, we may add 
that we look to you to contribute' your part, and we know we 
look now witli no prospect of disappointment from you, to a 
sound, healthy, and patriotic administration of the government. 
You will do all you can to put the Ship of State on the right 
tack. You will engage in no intrigue, and no corruptions, 
that think only of a party, and nothing of the Republic. You 
will exercise what influence you have to preserve the public 
peace, when with honor peace can be preserved. Indeed, we 
may say we look to you and to the illustrious man connected 
with you to undo much of what has been done for four years 
past. We want a patriotic, honest government. We want a 
government for the good of the people, not the good of party 
onlj^, and we are sure that in looking to you, we look to one 
who will ever maintain and never desert the right." 

To this address Mr. Fillmore made the following reply: 

" Mr. Chairman : A compliment from a city like 3'ours, the 
Empire City, not only of the Empire Slate, but the commer- 
cial emporium of our whole common country, could never be 
properlv replied to by me, even if I had time to prepare — but 
the suddenness of your announcement, and the warmth and 
heartiness with which you have welcomed me, quite unfit me 
to make any reply at all. 1 can only thank you, in my embar- 
rassment; but I am sure it is not to me this tribute is rendered, 
but to the illustrious man under whose name and whose prin- 
ciples we have achieved the brilliant civil victory that the tele- 
graph for the week past has been sending to us. In tb.at man, 
and liis simplicity, energy and straightforwardness, I have the 
highest confidence. I have never had the honor of taking him 
by the hand, or of meeting him face to face, but I have studied 
well his character, and I feel, therefore, that I know him well; 
for it is a character plain and open, to be read by every body, 
and not of that complex nature that deludes and puzzles the 
observer. 



114 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

" I have no doubt that -under his administration you will 
realize all the high and patriotic expectations that you enter- 
tain, and that the country will receive an impetus and a direc- 
tion, under his honest hands, that will go far, not only to make 
it flourish, but to make its institutions endure. I look to him 
with confidence for a restoration of sound republican principles, . 
and for an administration of honest men ; and with him, I am 
sure, we shall have the government of the popular voice — not 
the expression of the arbitrary will of one man. What the 
people demand, the people will have, and upon them will de- 
pend the success of the administration of Zachary Taylor. 
(Cheers.) 

" Gentlemen, I thank you heartily for the kindness with 
which you have welcomed me, and 1 wish you all happiness 
and prosperity." (Prolonged cheering.) 

About this time Mr. Fillmore wrote a private letter to a friend, 
which was so honorable, patriotic and truly national, that we 
copy the following extract : 

* * * " To me there is no manifestation of popular sen- 
timent which calls up such deep feelings of gratitude as that 
generous vote of my old friends and early constituents of the 
county of Erie. It is now twenty years since they first elected 
me to the Assembly, and from that day to this they have stood 
by me through good and through evil report, and sustained me 
under all circumstances with a zeal and fidelity almost unknown 
in this country; and the last crowning act of their continued 
kindness and- confidence awakens the deepest emotions of a 
grateful heart. 

" I trust, too, that you will not blame me for expressing the 
gratification and pride which I feel in receiving so flattering a 
vote in my native State. But these things are in a measure 
personal to myself, and therefore of little importancce. But 
the cordiality and unanimity with which the Whig ticket has 
been sustained every where. North and South, East and West, 
is a just cause of national felicitation. It proves that the great 
Whig party is truly a national party — that it occupies that 
safe and conservative ground which secures to every section of 
the country all that it has a right to claim under the guaranty 
of the constitution — that such rights are inviolate; — and as to 



VICE-PRESIDENT. 115 

all other questions of mere policy, where Congress has the con- 
stitutional right to legislate, the will of the people, as expressed 
through their representatives in Congress, is to control, and 
that will is not to be defeated by the arbitrary interposition of 
the veto power. 

This simple rule which holds sacred all constitutional guar- 
antees, and leaves the law-making power where the constitution 
placed it, in Congress, relieves the party at once from all the 
embarrassing questions that arise out of sectional differences of 
opinion, and enables it to act harmoniously for the good of the 
country. When the President ceases to control the law-making 
power, his individual opinions of what the law ought to be, 
become comparatively unimportant Hence we have seen 
Gen. Taylor, though attacked as a slaveholder and a pro- 
slavery man at the North, cordially supported and triumphantly 
elected by men opposed to slavery, in all its forms ; and though 
I have been charged at the South, in the most gross and wan- 
ton manner, with being an abolitionist and an incendiary, yet 
the Whigs of the South have cast these calumnies to the 
winds, and, without asking or expecting any thing more than 
what the constitution guarantees to them on this subject, they 
have yielded to me a most hearty and enthusiastic support. 
This was particularly . so in New Orleans, where the attack 
was most violent. 

" Really, these Southern Whigs are noble fellows. Would 
you not lament to see the Union dissolved, if for no other cause 
than that it separated us from such true, noble and high-minded 
associates ? But I regard this election as putting an end to all 
ideas of disunion. It raises up a national party, occupying a 
middle ground, and leaves the fanatics and disunionists, North 
and South, without the hope of destroying the fair fabric of our 
constitution. May it be perpetual 1" 

In February, 1849, Mr. Fillmore resigned his office as 
Comptroller of New York, and proceeded to Washington to 
assume the duties of his new office. 

The inauguration which took place on Monday, the 5th of 
March, 1849, was an occasion of unusual ceremony and festiv- 
ity. Multitudes of citizens had assembled in Washington from 
all parts of the Union, the attendance being greater than at 



116 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

the accession to power of any previous administralion. Striiros 
of martial music, the ringing of belJsy the waving of hundreds 
of flags, and the thronged procession, bore witness to the deep- 
interest the occasion had excited. Previous to the appearance 
of the President elect, the Senate had convened and appointed 
a temporary president. The diplomatic corps entered in their 
rich and magnificent costumes, which contrasted finely with 
the dark robes of the Justices of the Supreme Courts who sat 
opposite to them. 

;Mr. Dallas, the late Vice-president, had been for some time m 
the chamber, his hair of snowy whiteness and his perfect gen- 
tlemanly figure, naturally attractiag attention.. He occupied 
a seat in front of the secretary^* table facing the Senators. 
Presently Mr. Dallas was observed to retire,, and in the course 
of a few minutes he was seen re-entering the chamber in com- 
pany with Mr. Fillmore, whom he conducted to the chair of 
the Senate. The future presiding officer of that body took the 
vacant seat of his predecessor, wbe-re the oath of office was ad- 
ministered to him by the president p?'o tempare, when amid 
profound stillness he delivered, in the calm and dignified man- 
ner for which he is distinguished,, the following brief address: 

"Senators: Never having been honored with a seat on 
this floor, and never having acted as the presiding officer of 
any legislative body, you will not doubt my sincerity when I 
assure you that I assume the responsible duties of this chair 
with a conscious want of experiense and a just appreciation 
that I shall often need your friendly suggestions, and more 
often your indulgent forbearance. 

"I should indeed feel oppressed and disheartene<i did I not 
recollect that the Senate is composed of eminent statesmen, 
equally distinguished for their high intellectuai endowments 
and their amenity of manners, whose p(TSuasive eloquence is 
so happily tempered with habitual courtesy as to relieve your 
presiding officer from all that would be painful in the discharge 
of his duty, and render his position as agreeable as it must be 
instructive. 



FKESERVATION OF OEDEE. 117 

''Thus encouraged and sustained, I enter upon the duties 
assigned me, firmly resolved to discharge them with impar- 
tiality and to the best of my ability. But I should do injustice 
to the grateful emotions of my own heart, if I did not on this 
occasion express my warmest thanks for the distinguished 
honor that has been conferred upon me in being called by the 
voice of the nation to preside over your deliberations. 

"It will not, I trust, be deemed inappropriate to congratu- 
late you on the scene now passing before us. I allude to it in 
no partisan aspect, but as an ever recurring event contemplated 
by the constitution. Compare the peaceful changes of chief 
magistrate of this Republic with the recent sanguinary revolu- 
tions in Europe. 

" There th-e voice of the people has only been heard amid 
the din of arms and the horrors of domestic conflicts; but here 
in our own favored land, under the guidance of our constitu- 
tion, the resistless will of the nation has from time to time been 
peaceably expressed by the free will of the people, and all have 
bowed in obedient submission to their decree. 

" The administration which but yesterday wielded the desti- 
nies of this great nation, to-day quietly yields up its power, 
and, without a murmur, retires from the Capital. 

" I congratulate you, Senators, and I congratulate my country 
upon these oft-recurring and cheering evidences of our capac- 
ity for self-government. Let us hope that the subhme spec- 
tacle we now witness may be repeated as often as the people 
shall desire a change of rulers, and that this venerated consd- 
tution and this glorious Union may endure forever." 

Mr. Fillmore, while acting as Vice-president, presided over 
the Senate with a dignity and urbanity which has never been 
surpassed. Mr. Calhoun, in 1826, had announced to the Sen- 
ate his opinion that the Vice-president had no authority to call 
tSenators to order for any violation of courtesy or transgres- 
sion of the rules of debate. He conformed his practice to his 
opinion, and it had became a settled usage that a member was 
on no occasion called to order for any words he might utter 
on the floor of the Senate. Mr. Fillmore made a speech in 
which he explained the reasons why he thought that it was his 



118 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMORE. 

duty to preserve decorum, and, if occasion should render it nec- 
essary, reverse the usage of his predecessors. This determin- 
ation met the warm approval of the Senate, who ordered Mr- 
Fillmore's speech to be entered at length on their joumaL 



PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 119 



CHAPTER VIII. 

MR. FILLMORE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 

The large territorial acquisitions which were the conse- 
quence of the Mexican war occasioned controversies that made 
the brief administration of Gen. Taylor a period of intense 
public excitement The annexation of Texas, in which the war 
orioinated, met with general approval in the Southern States 
on account of its supposed tendency to fortify the institution of 
slavery. But if the territory ceded to the United States by 
the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo should all be carved into free 
States, the ultimate effect of annexation would be a great loss 
of power by the South. The fact that a portion of the North- 
ern representatives in Congress insisted on the insertion of the 
Wilmot Proviso in every act organizing a new territory, would 
have been productive of considerable irritation, even if there 
had been nothing else in the circumstances of the time to 
favor sectional excitement. But the application of California for 
admission into the Union as a free State, made the only ses- 
sion of Congress which took place under the administration of 
Gen. Taylor one of the most exciting that had occurred in 
many years. 

The rapid growth of California was without a parallel in 
history. The discovery of gold mines of extraordinary rich- 
ness and extent had caused an immense tide of emigration to 
set toward the new El Dorado, not only from all the Atlantic 
States, but from almost every quarter of the world. In less 
than two years from the discovery of her gold mines, California, 



120 BIOGEAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMOEE. 

previously almost without inhabitants, had become more pop 
ulous than some of the old States, more wealthy than sev- 
eral of them, and, without passing through the usual temtorial 
pupilage, she had formed a State constitution, organized a State 
government, and was applying for admission as one of the mem- 
bers of the federal Union. It was objected that her proceed- 
ings were irregular, that her territory was too large for a single 
State, and that her boundaries had been assumed without the 
authority of Congress. Under different circumstances, these 
objections would have had but little influence, considering the 
iirgeiit necessity which existed for a government of some kind. 
California had, at that time, no authorized government either ter- 
ritorial or state ; and yet from the heterogeneous character of 
her population and the absence of social restraints, no commu- 
nity stood in greater need of a firm and regular government 
strictly enforced. 

The question really in dispute related to the balance of 
power between the slaveholding and the non-slaveholding 
States. States had for many years been admitted into the 
Union by pairs, one from each section of the country ; and 
when California adopted her constitution tlie two classes of 
States had, for a long period, possessed an equal representation 
in the United States Senate. When she applied for admission 
as a free State, there was no slave State, either forming or 
likely to be formed, to balance her. From a more rapid 
growth of population the North had long had a growing pre- 
ponderance in the lower branch of Congress, and if California 
were admitted as a free State the South would be in a minor- 
ity in both Houses, and without any power of effectual resist- 
ance to legislative measures, which it might consider hostile 
to its interests. The Northern majority in the House of Rep- 
resentatives was certain to go on increasing, and if the equilib- 
rium of the Senate were once destroyed, there was no ground 
to hope that it could ever be recovered^ The admission of 



ADMISSION OF CALIFORNIA. ' 121 

California into the Union as a free State, therefore, seemed to 
place Southern rights and interests forever afterward at the 
mercy of the North. 

It was this state of things which gave so deep a significance 
to the admission of California, and rendered it the occasion of 
such earnest and vehement controversy. It was foreseen that 
the South would struggle against it as if its very existence were 
in peril, for in all future legislation involving the question of 
slavery it was regarded as a death blow to its interests. If 
California were admitted, the South could see no safety except 
in secession from the Union. 

Mr. Clay, with the far-reaching sagacity for which he was 
distinguished, at once comprehended the magnitude of the 
crisis. He surrendered his whole mind to earnest and painful 
reflecdon, with a view to discover some method by which con- 
flicting interests might be reconciled, and the Union rescued from 
the imminent peril which threatened its existence. He clearly 
saw that the loss of the balance of power between the two sec- 
tions of country would become a matter of trivial importance 
to the South, if, together with the admission of California, 
measures could be adopted which would forever remove all 
questions affecting the interests of slavery beyond the sphere 
of federal legislation. The South might reconcile themselves 
to the necessity of passing into a perpetual minority by the 
admission of California, if there could be coupled with her ad- 
mission a final settlement of all questions in which the interests 
of the two great sections of the country were supposed to con- 
flict. It was with a view to accomplish such a settlement, 
that he brought forward his celebrated Compromise scheme, 
which its enemies named, in derision, the "Omnibus Bill." 
It proposed to admit California into the Union as a free 
State ; to organize territorial governments for New Mexico and 
Utah, leaving the question of slavery to the decision of the in- 
habitants; to define the boundaries of Texas; and to make 
6 



122 EIOGEAPHY OF MILLA.RD FILLMOEE. 

more eflfectual provision for enforcing the requirements of tbe 
constitution relating to fugitives from labor. The combining 
of so great a variety of measures into one bill, was what led to 
its being designated as the "Omnibus." Althougli it is, with- 
out doubt, a sound principle of legislation that every measure 
ought, as far as possible, to stand on its own separate merits, 
it seemed necessary, in order to accomplish the settlement 
which Mr. Clay proposed, that these should stand together. 
Whatever might be the ostensible pretexts for opposing the 
admission of California, the actual reason was, that it destroyed 
irrecoverably the balance of power between the Northern and 
Southern States. This consideration aside^the reasons for her 
admission were too powerful and urgent to be resisted. But 
this consideration had so strong a tendency to inflame Southern 
feeling, that the measure had little chance of success unless tiie 
others could be joined with it. The South was not likely to 
relinquish, voluntarily, all check upon legislation affecting sla- 
very, unless it could be assured that the whole subject was to 
be withdrawn from future congressional action. Hence the 
importance Mr. Clay attached to combining all these separate 
measures into a sino-le bill. 

Other public men, who were equally patriotic, and equally 
solicitous that all the distracting questions growing out of 
slavery should receive a final settlement, while they admitted 
the importance of all Mr. Clay's measures, and the indispens- 
able necessity for their all passing, considered it a matter of 
indifference whether they were embodied in a single bill or 
acted on separately. Among these was Mr. Webster, who was 
as earnest in his devotion to the Union, and as ardent in his 
efforts for the restoration of tranquillity, as any member of the 
Senate. He thought it due to California that she should be 
admitted into the Union; to the South that the constitutional 
provision for the recovery of fugitive slaves should be enforced ; 
to the whole country, that the quarrel between the citizens of 



THE SLAVERY QUESTION. 123 

Texas and New Mexico should be settled ; but so (ay as related 
to slavery in the territories, he thought it a question of no 
practical importance, and not worth the ill feeling it had engen- 
dered. He contended in one of the ablest speeches ever 
delivered in Congress, that there was not a foot of territory 
within the limits of the United States whose condition, as re- 
gards slavery, was not already fixed by some irrepealable 
law. Neith^ he nor any other statesman, North or South — 
neither he nor any other citizen of any section of the country, 
supposed, at that time,, that a repeal of the Missouri compro- 
mise would ever be proposed, much less ever become possible; 
and when he called it an irrepealable law excluding slavery 
from all territory north of an established line, nobody ques- 
tioned or doubted that, as far as that went, he was perfectly 
correct. Nobody could then have foreseen so gross a political 
blunder, such a wanton violation of good faith, as has since 
been comniitted by a Democratic administration, and sanctioned 
by the Democratic party. With regard to the terriiories to 
which the Missouri compromise did not apply, slavery was ex- . 
eluded from some of them by positive enactment, and from 
the others by laws equally operative and entirely irrepealable. 
As there was nothing which was suscepdble of alteration in 
any territory belonging to the United States, so far related 
to the existence of slavery in it, Mr. Webster judged correctly 
that agitation on this subject was as idle as it was mischievous. 
But whatever foundation there might be for agitation, whether 
much or little, he considered it important that a period should 
be put to it. At the death of Gen. Taylor, Congress had been 
in session upward of seven months, and the whole time had 
been consumed in discussions relating to slavery. Not to dwell 
on the violent sectional animosities which such discussions can 
not fail to excite, this neglect of the usual business of leg- 
islation is in itself a great evil. It is a great evil to have 
the wheels of useful legislation blocked by such discussions 



124: BIOGRAPHY OF MILLABD FILLMORE. 

even for a single session; but when the whole time of Congress 
is, year after year, wasted in this mischievous employment, and 
all the great interests of the country permitted to suffer for 
want of necessary legislation, it is high time that so troublesome 
and pernicious a topic should be withdrawn from national poli- 
tics. This was the general feeling of patriotic men in 1850, 
and although many statesmen thought the separate portions of 
Mr. Clay's omnibus bill should receive separate action, they did 
not doubt that the success of every measure was necessary to 
the tranquillity of the country and the preservation of the Union. 

It was in the midst of those discussions, which had already 
continued more than seven months, that Gen. Taylor died. 
His death was sudden and unexpected, and occurring at a time 
when the public mind was profoundly agitated and full of ap- 
prehension, it was calculated to make a deep impression. It 
was a most trying and critical period for the government to 
pass into new hands, and the country appreciated the difficul- 
ties which would surround Gen. Taylor's successor. 

President Taylor died on Tuesday, the ath of July, 1850, 
at half past ten in the evening. On the preceding Thursday, 
which was the anniversary of American independence, he was 
in the enjoyment of his usual health, and attended the cele- 
bration of the day at the Washington Monument. The oration 
was lono- and the President listened to it with his head uncov- 
ered, exposed to a breeze which it was feared at the time 
mia'ht be detrimental to his health. Next morninsf he was at- 
tacked with cholera morbus; remittent fever supervened; the 
disease baffled all the skill of able physicians, and an hour and a 
half before midnight on Tuesday, his eyes were closed in their 
last sleep. He retained his reason to the last, and was perfectly 
calm and tranquil. His last words were, " I am prepared — 

I HAVE ENDEAVORED TO DO MY DUTY." 

Zachary Taylor was born in Orange county, in Virginia, 
in 1784. He early displayed great energy and boldness of 



PRESIDENT TAYLOR. 125 

character, and at tlie age of twenty-four, was appointed a lieu- 
tenant in the army. This was during the administration of 
President Jefferson. In 1812, he rose to the rank of captain, 
and after the declaration of war with Great Britain in that 
year, he was brevetted major by President Madison, for his 
gallant defense of Fort Harrison against a large body of sav- 
ao-es. In 1832, he had been promoted to the rank of colonel, 
and distinguished himself in the Black Hawk war. Ordered 
to Florida in 1836, he distinguished himself by his signal 
services against the Seminoles, and was created brevet brigadier 
general and commander-in-chief of the United States forces in 
Florida. He was afterward transferred to the command of the 
division of the army on the south-western frontier; was ordered 
to Texas in 1845; advanced to the .left bank of the Rio Grande, 
and, in the early part of the Mexican war, won battles whose 
names are household words at every American fireside. 

When, as a reward for illustrious services in the field, he 
was called by an admiring and grateful people to the head of the 
government, he exhibited patriotism, honesty and good sense, 
united with a kindness and benignity of temper which en- 
deared him to his countrymen. 

On the tenth of July, the next day after the decease of 
Gen. Taylor, Mr. Fillmore sent to the Senate a brief message 
announcing that he should no longer act as their presiding offi- 
cer, and another relating to the death of President Taylor, which 
we copy : 

"Washington, July 10th, 1850. 

^'Fellow-citizens of the Senate and of the House of Rep- 
resentatives: — I have to perform the melancholy duty of an- 
nouncing to you that it has pleased Almighty God to remove 
from thts life Zachary Taylor, late President of the United 
States. He deceased last evening at the hour of half-past ten 
o'clock, in the midst of his family, and surrounded by affection- 
ate friends, calmly, and in the full possession of all his facul- 
ties. Among his last words were these, which he uttered with 



126 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

emphatic distinctness: *I have always done my duty — I am 
ready to die; my only regret is for the friends I leave be- 
hind me.' 

, " Having announced to you, fellow-citizens, this most afflict- 
ing bereavement, and assuring you that it has penetrated no 
heart with deeper grief than mine, it remains for me to say 
that I propose this day, at twelve o'clock, in the hall of the House 
of Representatives, in the presence of both houses of Congress, 
to take the oath prescribed by the constitution, to enable me to 
enter on the execution of the office which this event has de- 
volved on me. 

"Millard Fillmore." 

Mr. Webster then submitted the following resolutions which 
were unanimously agreed to: 

" Resolved, That the two houses will assemble this day in 
the hall of the House of Representatives, at twelve o'clock, to be 
present at the administration of the oath prescribed by the con- 
stitution to the late Vice-president of the United Slates, to ena- 
ble him to discharge the powers and duties of the office of 
Pre!«ident of the United States, devolved on him by the death 
of Zachary Taylor, late President of the United States. 

*'^ Resolved, That the secretary of the Senate present the 
above resolution to the House of Representatives, and ask its 
concurrence therein." 

A message was then received from the House of Represent- 
atives transmitting. a resolution and requesting the concurrence 
of the Senate. The resolution was as follows: 

^^ Resolved, That the Hon. Messrs. Winthrop, Morse, and 
Morehead, be appointed a committee on the part of this House, 
to join such a committee as may be appointed by the Senate, 
to wait on the President of the United States, and inform him 
that the Senate and House of Representatives will be in read- 
iness to receive him in the hall of the House of Representatives 
this day, at twelve o'clock, for the purpose of witnessing the ad- 
ministration of the oath prescribed by the constitution to enable 
him to enter upon the execution of the office." 



DEATH OF PRESIDENT TAYLOR. 127 

The Senate concurred in the resolution, appointed Mr. 
Soule, Mr. Davis, of Massachusetts, and Mr. Underwood, a 
committee on their part, and ordered tlieir secretary to notify 
the House of Representatives accordingly. 

Mr. Soule afterward informed the Senate thai the committee 
appointed to wait on the President had performed the duty 
assio-ned them, and that they had been informed by the Pres- 
ident that he would take the oath of office at twelve o'clock, in 
the hail of the House of Representatives, and that he desired the 
attendance of the Senate. Whereupon the Senate proceeded 
to the hall of the House of Representatives. 

In the hall of the House of Representatives after the appear- 
ance of the Senate, the President entered accompanied by the 
cabinet, the members remaining standing as a mark of respect. 
The oath was administered by Judge C ranch, and after the 
President of the United States, the cabinet and the. Senate had 
retired, the speaker announced that he had received another 
messao-e from the President. It was then read as follows: 

o 

"Washington, July 10th, 1850. 

^'Fellow-citizens of the Senate 07id of tlie House of Repre- 
sentatives: — A great man has fallen among us, and a whole 
country is called to an occasion of unexpected deep and gen- 
eral mourning. 

" 1 recommend to the two Houses of Congress to adopt such 
measures as in their discretion may seem proper, to perform 
with due solemnity the funeral obsequies of Zachary Taylor, 
late President of the United States; and thereby to signify the 
great and afieciionate regard of the American people for the 
memory of one whose hfe has been devoted to the public ser- 
vice; whose career in arms has not been surpassed in useful- 
ness or brilliancy; who has been so recently raised by the 
unsolicited voice of the people to the highest civil authority in 
the government, which he administered with so much honor 
and advantage to his country; and by whose sudden death so 
many hopes of future usefulness have been blighted forever. 

"To you, Senators and Representatives of a nation in tears, 



128 BIOGRAPnY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

I can say nothing wliicTi can alleviate the sorrow with which 
you are oppressed. 

"I appeal to you to aid me under the trying circumstances 
which surround, in the discharge of ihe auties, from which, 
however much I may be oppressed by them, I dare .not shrink; 
and I rely upon Him, who holds in his hands the destinies of 
nations, to endow me with the requisite strengtli for the task, 
and to avert from our country the evils apprehended from the 
heavy calamity which has befallen us. 

"I shall most readily concur in whatever measures the wis- 
dom of the two Houses may suggest, as befitting this deeply 
melancholy occasion. "Millard Fillmore." 

The funeral of President Taylor was celebrated on Saturday 
the 13th of July, with solemn ceremonies befitting the high 
character and official dignity of the deceased. 

We have already alluded to the agitating controversy in 
Congress during the pending of which Gen. Taylor was stricken 
down by a dispensation of providence, leaving the country in 
a condition so critical as to devolve an immense weight of re- 
sponsibility on his constitutional successor. To add to the em- 
barrassment of President Fillmore, the cabinet immediately 
tendered their resignation, and the first question he had to con- 
sider was whether he would solicit their continuance in office 
or appoint a new cabinet. 

It was understood that the cabinet of Gen. Taylor were 
opposed to Mr. Clay's omnibus bill, then pending in the Sen- 
ate, with a great deal of doubt hanging over its success. The 
President approved, in the main, of the measures embodied in 
that bill, and thought it his duty to favor their adoption. He 
rightly thought that on questions so important there should be 
no difference of opinion between the President and his consti- 
tutional advisers, and that it was necessary to have a cabinet 
who would sustnin him in the course he had determined to 
adopt, and whose reputation was identified with his success. 
He therefore decided to accept the resignation of Gen. Taylor's 
cabinet, and appoint a new one. 



THE NEW CABINET. 129 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE COMPROMISE MEASURES AND FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 

On the 20th of July, ten days after President Fillmore took 
the oath of office, he transmitted to the Senate a message nom- 
inating the following named gentlemen as his cabinet : 

Daniel Webster, of Massachusetts, Secretary of State. 
Thomas Corwin, of Ohio, Secretary of the Treasury. 
James A. Pearce, of Maryland, Secretary of the Interior. 
William A. Graham, of North Carolina, Secretary of the 
Navy. 

Edward Bates, of Missouri, Secretary of War. 
Nathan K Hall, of New York, Postmaster- General. 
John J. Crittenden, of Kentucky, Attorney-General. 

This cabinet embodied eminent ability, large experience in 
public affairs, and great weight of character. The nominations 
were all confirmed by the Senate, but Mr. Pearce and Mr. 
Bates were prevented by circumstances from accepting the 
places tendered them. After some delay, Alexander H. H. 
Stuart, of Virginia, was appointed Secretary of the Interior, 
and C. M. Conrad, of Louisiana, Secretary of War. 

Only a few days elapsed after Mr. Fillmore's accession to the 
presidency, before the "omnibus bill" was brought to a vote in 
the Senate and defeated. 

Affairs were now rapidly approaching a crisis which de- 
manded the calmest wisdom united with the greatest firmness. 
Strong anti-slavery conventions were held in the North ; equally 
6* 



130 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOEE. 

strong secession conventions were held in the South ; the spirit 
of sectional strife seemed arming itself for a mighty conflict. 
The Senators and Representatives from California had become 
weary of their long waiting at Washington knocking »t the 
doors of Congress; Texas and New Mexico, in the midst of an 
angry controversy relative to their boundaries, were arming 
for civil war; the disatfected South was ready to sustain Texas 
in her claims ; and it became necessary for the general gov- 
ernment to protect New Mexico against armed invasion by 
that State. 

The President ordered the requisite military force and mu- 
nitions of war to be put in motion for New Mexico, and on the 
sixth of August, 1850, he sent a message to Congress advising 
that body of the imminent danger of a collision, and urging, in 
the strongest terms, a speedy settlement of the controversy. 
Cono-ress appreciated the danger, renewed its efforts to settle 
the vexed questions, and soon passed the several acts by which 
California was admitted into the Union as a State; the bound- 
ary line between Texas and New Mexico defined, and an 
indemnity provided for the claim of Texas; territorial govern- 
ments estabUshed for New Mexico and Utah ; the slave trade 
abolished in the District of Columbia; and more effectual 
provision made for the rendition of fugitive slaves. These 
have since been collectively designated as the "compromise 
measures." 

The President had some doubt whether the fugitive slave 
act did not conflict with the provision of the constitution re- 
lating to the writ of habeas corpus, and referred the subject to 
the Attorney-General. Attorney-General Crittenden prepared 
a written opinion, in which he showed by a clear and conclu- 
sive argument, supported by the decisions of the Supreme 
Court, that there is nothing in the bill submitted to him, 
which is in conflict with the constitution, or which suspends 
or was intended to suspend the writ of kaheas corpus. It is a 



131 

well known and admitted fact, proved by abundant historical 
evidence, and assumed in all judicial decisions relating to the 
subject, that the clause of the constitution which requires the 
surrender of fugitive slaves was intended to secure to the citi- 
zens of slaveholding States complete ownership in their slaves 
in every State or territory of the Union into which they might 
escape. It devolved on the general government to make that 
security effectual, and accordingly the act of 1793 was passed, 
which, so far as it respects any constitutional question that 
can arise out of it, is identical with the bill submitted to the 
Attorney- General for his opinion. It authorized the like arrest 
of the fugitive slave, the like trial, the like judgment, the like 
certificate, with the like authority to the owner, by virtue of 
that certificate as his warrant, to remove him to the State or 
territory from which he escaped. And yet the constitutional- 
ity of the act of 1793 has been affirmed by the adjudications 
of State tribunals, and by the courts of the United States, 
without a single instance of dissent. The Supreme Court of 
the United States has decided that, independent of any aid 
from legislation, the owner of a fugitive slave may, in virtue 
of the constitution and his -own right of property, seize and 
re-capture him in any State or territory in which he may find 
him, and carry him back to the place from which he escaped. 
The bill under consideration, therefore, conferred no right on 
the owner of a fugitive slave, but only gave him an appointed 
and peaceable remedy, in place of the more exposed and in- 
secure, but not less lawful mode of self-redress. The fugitive 
has no reason to complain of the bill, for it adds no coercion 
to that which the owner of the slave might himself exercise 
without any resort to legal process. It is in fact a benefit to 
the fugi'ive so far as it interposes judicial authority between 
him and the power of his owner. 

With regard to whether this act suspended the writ of 
habeas corpus^ which was the point to which the President had 



132 BIOGEAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

more particdarly called bis attention, the Attorney-General 
was clearly of tiie opinion that there was no incompatibility 
between any of the provisions of the bill and the privilege of 
that writ, in its utmost constitutional latitude. It is not within the 
privilege or province of that great writ to loose those whom 
the law has bound, but to discharge persons from illegal custody. 
The writ follows the law and obeys the law. If on application 
for this writ it shall appear to the court or judge that the con- 
finement of the person asking for it is lawful, the writ will al- 
ways be refused. If a person is in custody by the decision of 
a court from which there is no appeal, the decision itself is to 
be reoarded as conclusive evidence that the confinement is 
legal, and not only can the writ of habeas corpus not discharge 
him, but no court or judge has any authority to grant it. 
There is no process or tribunal by which the decisions of a 
court of last resort can be reviewed, and there is nothing in 
the writ of habeas corpus by which they can be set aside. 

A provision of the constitution of the United States requires 
that fugitive slaves shall be surrendered to their owners. The 
bill for their rendition was intended tft enforce this requirement. 
It constitutes a tribunal with exclusive jurisdiction to determine 
summarily and without appeal, who are fugitive slaves. The 
judgment of every tribunal of exclusive jurisdiction, where no 
appeal lies, is of necessity conclusive upon every other tribunal ; 
and therefore the judgment of the tribunal created by the 
fugitive slave act is conclusive upon all the tribunals. When- 
ever this judgment is made to appear, it is conclusive of the 
right of the owner to retain in his custody the fugitive from 
his service, and to remove him back to the State from which 
he escaped. If it is shown on the application of the fugitive 
slave for the writ of habeas corpus, it prevents the issuing of 
the writ — if upon the return, it discharges the writ and re- 
stores or maintains the custody. 

Such is the substance of the reasoning by which the Attorney- 



THE FUGITIVE SLAYE LAW. 133 

General supported his opinion, and being satisfactory to the 
President as to the constitutional question, he signed the fugi- 
tive slave law, as well as the other bills previously enumerated, 
and known as " the compromise measures." 

The act for the rendition of fugitive slaves was immediately 
attacked with great violence by the anti-slavery party of the 
North. Slaves were rescued from the custody of the United 
States marshals at Boston, Syracuse, and at Christiana, in the 
State of Pennsylvania, and, in the last named of these places, 
one or two persons were killed. The President avowed his 
intention to execute the law. When intelligence of the pro- 
ceedings of the Boston mob reached Washington, the President 
issued his proclamation calling upon all officers to do their duty, 
and prosecutions were instituted against the rioters, but the 
prejudices of the jury ajid the difficulty of identifying the 
criminals generally enabled them to escape. At Syracuse 
one was convicted, but he died before sentence was passed 
upon him. 

The vehemence with which the fugitive slave act was as- 
sailed, renders it proper that we should explain its necessity 
more fully than would otherwise be consistent with our limits. 
The President was denounced for having given it his approval, 
was even threatened with violence in anonymous communica- 
tions, and the most strenuous exertions were made to induce 
the people to resist the execution of the law by force. 

The opposition which was ostensibly directed against the 
law, was really aimed at the provision of the' constitution 
which the law was intended to enforce. It was considered more 
decorous to assail a particular act of legislation than to make 
an open declaration of hostility against the constitution of the 
country; but the transactions of this period will be wholly 
misconceived unless we look beneath the pretences of the anti- 
slavery party, and discern the motives by which they were 
actually governed. 



134: BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

The constitution of the United States declares that "no 
person held to service or labor in one State under the laws 
thereof, escaping into another, shall in consequence of any law 
or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, 
but SHALL be delivered up on the claim of the party to whom 
such service or labor may be due." 

That the real ground of opposition to the fugitive slave law 
was a wish to defeat this provision of the constitution, is proved 
by the fact, that in the violent attempts to rescue negroes from 
their claimants, there was scarcely a case in which there was 
any reasonable, doubt that the person claimed was actually 
a fugitive slave — that he was really one of those persons whom 
the constitution requires to be deUvered up on the claim of the 
owner. 

Another reason for supposing the opposition was aimed at 
the constitution itself, is found in the admissions and avowals 
of the anti-slavery party itself. There would perhaps be an 
unfairness in quoting the language of obscure and irresponsi- 
ble members of the party ; we will therefore draw our proofs 
from the speeches of the ablest and most respected of its re- 
cognized leaders. WiUiam H. Seward, of New York, has for 
many years been regarded as the leading anti-slavery man of 
the Northern States, and the principal expounder of anti-slavery 
doctrines. He has repeatedly declared his opposidon to that 
provision of the constitution which requires the surrender of 
fugitive slaves. In a speech, delivered at Cleveland, Ohio, in 
1848, Mr. Seward said: "It is written in the constitution of 
the United States that five slaves^ shall 'count equal to three 
free men, as a basis of representation; it is also written, in 
violation of the Divine law, that we shall surrender the fugitive 
slave who takes refuge at our fireside from his relentless 
pursuers." * 

* Seward's Works, Vol. Ill, p. .^00. 



135 

In the same speech Mr. Seward exhorts his hearers to use 
their efforts to defeat the opetation of that provision of the 
constitution which he had told them was " in violation of the 
Divine law." He said : " Inculcate, then, the law of freedom 
and the equal rights of man ; reform your own code — extend 
a cordial welcome to the fugitive who lays his weary limbs at 
your door, and defend him as you woidd your paternal gods; 
correct your own error that slavery has any constitutional 
guaranty which may not be released, and ought not to be re- 
linquished. Say to slavery when it shows its 6oM6?and demands 
the pound of flesh, that if it draws one drop of blood, its life 
shall pay the forfeit" * It is impossible to mistake the mean- 
ing of this reference to the bond of Shylock in Shakspeare's 
Merchant of Venice. The " bond " is that provision in the 
constitution which he had declared to be " in violation of the 
Divine law," and the advice is to thwart its operation by sub- 
tleties of interpretation which would render its execution impos- 
sible. The speech from which these quotations are made, was 
republished in 1853, with Mr. Seward's approbation, in his col- 
lected works, and is introduced by the editor in terms of the 
hiohest commendation. 

o 

In the year 1850, in the Senate of the United States, Mr. 
Seward again asserts that the provision of the constitution 
relating to the rendition of fugitive slaves, is of no binding 
force. In his speech on the admission of California — a speech 
which he had prepared with great care — he said : '•' Your 
constitution and laws convert hospitality to the refugee from 
the most degrading oppression on earth into a crime, but all 
mankind except you esteem that hospitality a virtue. * * * 
I know of only two compacts found in diplomatic history that 
admitted the extradition of slaves. Here is one of them.'* 
(He then quotes from an old treaty between Russia and the 

* Seward's Works, Vol. Ill, p. 301. 



136 BIOGEAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMOKE. 

Greek Emperors of Constantinople, and says): "This was in 
the year of Grace, 902, in the period called the 'Dark Ages/ 
and the contracting powers were despotisms. And here is the 
other." (After quoting it, he says): "This is from tlie cori.- 
stitution of the United States in 1787, and the parties were 
the republican States of this Union. The la2v of nations dis- 
avows such compacts — the law of nature ivritten on the hearts 
and consciences of men repudiates themP * Further on in 
the same speech he said: "But you answer that the Constitu- 
tion recognizes property in slaves. It would be sufficient then 
to reply, that this constitutional recognition must he void, be- 
cause it is repugnant to the law of nature and of nations." * 

These quotations are sufficient to show that the violent 
hostility which was directed against the law of 1850, would 
have been equally violent against any law which ejfectually 
carried out the provision of the constitution. In fact, the act 
of 1793, which was signed by Washington, was formerly de- 
nounced in much the same manner as that of 1850 has been 
since its passage. 

Neither the law of 1793, nor that of 1850, nor indeed any 
enactment on the subject, is defensible, except on the supposi- 
tion that the provision of the constitution relating to fugitives 
is of bindino; obhofation, and that under it the owner of a fuo-i- 
tive is really entitled to have his property restored to him. 
All argument in defense of any efficient law on the subject is 
perfectly idle when addressed to those who, like Mr. Seward 
and his followers, consider that constitutional provision "in 
violation of the Divine law," and suppose it is therefore their 
duty to "repudiate" it. As President of the United States, 
Mr. Fillmore had taken a solemn oath to support the constitu- 
tion^ and. as he did not feel at liberty to violate his oath, his 
approval of the fugitive slave law must be judged by its 

* Seward's Works, Vol. I, pp. 65, 66, and 71. 



THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 137 

conformity to the constitution, and not by the principles of 
"the higher hiw." 

By those who admit tlic binding- force of the constitution, 
the principal objection to the law of 1850 is, that the proceed- 
ings under it are summary. In judging of the validity of this 
objection, it is necessary- to bear in mind that the provision for 
the surrender of fugitives from labor stands in the constitutiou 
coupled with one for the surrender of fugitives from justice. 
In the case of fugitives from justice, the proceedings are al- 
ways summar}-, both in cases arising under the constitution 
and those arising under treaties with foreign nations for the 
surrender of such fugitives. The alleged criminal is arrested 
for the violation of the laws of the State from which he has 
fled, and it conforms to reason that the law^s of a State should 
be administered by its own tribunals. When a fugitive from 
justice is surrendered, the proceedings are therefore always 
summary and preliminary, and the prisoner is carried for trial 
to the State or country whose laws he has violated. In the 
case of a fugitive from labor, the same principle applies. The 
constitutional provision reads, " No person held to service or 
labor in one State, under the laws thereof^ escaping into an- 
other," etc. As he is made a slave by the laws of the State 
from which he has escaped, the tribunals of that State are 
deemed the appropriate ones for determining the question of 
his liberty. The principles of freedom as much require that 
a fugitive from justice shall have a trial before he is surren- 
dered to his claimant, as they do that a fugitive from labor 
shall have such a trial. In all the slave States independent 
judicial tribunals are always open to receive and decide upon 
petitions or applications for freedom, and there is no proof that 
the decisions of these tribunals are not always fair and upright. 
Under the act of 1793, the proceedings were likewise sum- 
mary, and there was no trial by jury. However desirable, on 
some grounds, a trial by jury in such cases might seem, it 



138 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

would be practically impossible in several of the non-slavehold- 
ing States. To say nothing of the prejudices of the jurors 
which render it certain beforehand that they would never 
agree on a verdict of surrender, however clear the evidence 
that the person was actually a fugitive, the refusal by some of 
the States of the use of their jails and of the assistance of their 
officers, would make it impossible to detain the prisoner while 
preparations could be made for his trial and witnesses sum- 
moned from a distant State. The fugitive would no doubt be 
rescued by a mob in the interim, and sent out of the country 
by " the underground railroad." Or even if the claimant should 
finally recover his property, he would incur expenses so great 
that the provision of the constitution in his favor would be 
practically annulled. 

As President Fillmore's signing the fugitive slave bill is the 
chief ground of all the assaults which have been made on his 
public character from that day to this, it may not be out of 
place to state the reasons which rendered that act necessary. 

The act passed February 12th, 1793, and approved by 
President Washington, prescribed the manner in which fugi- 
tives should be claimed and given up. By this act the owner 
was authorized to seize and arrest his slave wherever he could 
find him, and take him before a judge of the United States 
courts, or any magistrate of a county, city or town corporate 
in the State in which the arrest was made, and if such judge 
or magistrate was satisfied that his claim was well founded it 
was made his duty to give a certificate which was declared to 
be a sufficient warrant for removing the slave to the State 
from which he had fled. 

This law, which was passed soon after the adoption of the 
constitution, and by a Congress of which some of the framers 
of the constitution were members, met with general approval 
in all parts of the country. Although the proceedings under 
it were summary, without any other trial than an affidavit 



THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 13^ 

before a magistrate, and a fine of five hundred dollars was im- 
posed on any person who should knowingly obstruct the 
claimant or his agent, the bill passed the Senate without a 
division, and the House of Representatives by a majority of 
forty-eight to seven. 

After the passage of this law a strong sentiment grew up in 
the northern States in opposition to slavery. Several State^ 
that had previously tolerated it passed acts for its abolition, 
and some even went so far as to prohibit State officers from 
affording any assistance in executing the law of Congress for 
the recovery of fugitives. It seemed to be conceded by the 
highest authority — the Supreme Court of the United States 
— that Congress had no power to compel such assistance. 
The consequence was that the execution of the law devolved 
on the judges of the United States courts alone; but they 
were too much occupied to give it their attention, even if the 
smallness of their number and the distances at which they 
resided apart had not rendered them inaccessible. The pro- 
vision of the constitution, therefore, which the law was in- 
tended to carry out, was practically annulled. 

A case illustrating this occurred in Pennsylvania, in 1839. 
A female slave from Maryland, who had escaped into the State, 
was pursued by the agent of her master, arrested, and brought 
before a Pennsylvania justice of the peace. He dechned to 
take cognizance of the matter, or to grant the certificate the 
law required, whereupon the agent took her home to her mas- 
ter without any written warrant, was indicted in Pennsylvania 
for kidnapping, tried and convicted. He appealed to the 
United States Supreme Court. That tribunal reversed the 
judgment of the Pennsylvania court, and held that no State 
law could deprive the owner of the right to seize his slave, 
even without process, and take him home. 

This decision was rendered in 1843. Not long afterward 
efforts began to be made in Congress for an amendment to the 



140 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

existing law, which was seen to be defective in the fallowino^ 
pai-ticulars: First, it had not provided a sufficient number of 
United States officers for its execution; secondly, it had not 
provided for the arrest of the fugitive in any other naanner 
than by the claimant himself; thirdly, it had made no adequate 
provision to resist the force which reckless fanaticism might 
bring to rescue the slave; and fourthly, it had failed to define 
the kind of proof necessary to justify a certificate for his sur- 
render. These are the defects which were souo-ht to be rem- 
edied by the act of 1850. 

By this act provision was made for the appointment of a 
suitable number of commissioners who are to have concurrent 
jurisdiction with the judges of the United States courts in 
lioaring and determining these cases. Process for the arrest 
of the fugitive is to be executed by the marshal of the district, 
who is empowered to call to his assistance any number of 
persons to aid him in the performance of his duty. Proofs are 
to be taken by a court in the State from which the fugitive 
has fled, to establish the fact that he owed service to his claim- 
ant, and in case of apprehended resistance to his removal by 
his master, the commissioner is authorized to direct the mar- 
shal to return him to the State whence he fled. These are 
the leading provisions of the act about which so much clamor 
has been raised, and we may safely appeal to any intelligent 
man to say whether they, or some other provisions equally 
efl'ective, were not demanded of Congress by the requirements 
of the constitution. 

The majority of the people in every section of the country 
respect the constitution and are disposed to obey the' laws. 
Furiously as the fugitive slave law was for a while resisted by 
excited fanatics, it, as well as the other compromise measures, 
gradually came to be acquiesced in by the general and almost 
unanimous assent of the country. That this acquiescence and 
the tranquillity which flowed from it have since been disturbed, 



THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 141 

is the fault of a Democratic administration, which threw a new 
brand of discord among the States of this Union in the repeal 
of the Missouri compromise. ♦ 

The provision of the constitution for the surrender of fugi- 
tive slaves, and laws enacted for its enforcement, have encoun- 
tered so much intemperate opposition, that we devote space to 
some extracts from the opinions of Justice M'Lean, of the United 
States Supreme Court, delivered in the Pennsylvania case, to 
which we have already alluded ; and in other cases which came 
before him in the Seventh Circuit We quote these ill prefer- 
ence to the opinions of other members of the court, because 
Judge M'Lean is widely talked of as one of the gentlemen from 
whom the present anti-slavery party will select its candidate for 
the presidency. 

In the following argument Judge M'Lean not only assents 
U) the opinion of the Supreme Court that Congress has consti- 
tutional authority to pass effective laws for the rendition of 
fugitive slaves, but he overturns the favorite theory of Mr. 
Seward and other an ti- slavery leaders, that the execution* of 
the constitutional provision for their surrender properly belongs 
to the States. We quote from the sixteenth volume of Peters' 
Reports : 

" That the constitution was adopted in a spirit of compro- 
mise, is matter of history. And all experience shows that to 
attain the great objects of this fundamental law, it must be 
construed and enforced in a spirit of enlightened forbearance 
and justice. Without adverting to other conflicting views and 
interests of the States represented in the general convention, 
the subject of slavery was then, as it is now, a most delicate 
and absorbing consideration. In some of the States it was 
considered an evil, and a strong opposition to it, in all its forms, 
was felt and expressed. In others it was viewed as a cherished 
right, incorporated into the social compact and sacredly guarded 
by law. 

" Opinions so conflicting, and which so deeply pervaded the 
elements of society, could be brought to a reconciled action 



142 ETOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

only by an exercise of exalted patriotism. Fortunately for Hhe 
country, this patriotism was not wanting in the convention and 
in the States. The danger of discord and ruin was seen, and 
felt, and acknowledged ; and this led to the formation of the con- 
federacy. The constitution, as it is, can not be said to have era- 
bodied, in all its parts, the peculiar views of any great section 
of the Union; but it was adopted by a wise and far-reaching- 
conviction, that it was the best which, Uiider the circumstances, 
could be devised ; and that its imperfections would be lost sight 
of, if not forgotten, in the national prosperity and glory which 
it would secure. 

" A law is better understood by a knowledge of the evils 
which led to its adoption. And this appHes most strongly to 
a fundamental law. 

" At an early period of our history, slavery existed in all the 
colonies; and fugitives from labor were claimed and delivered 
up under a spirit of comity or conventional law among the 
colonies. The articles of confederation contained no provision 
on the subject, and there can be no doubt that the provision 
introduced into the constitution was the result of experience 
and manifest necessity. A matter so delicate, important, and 
exciting, was very properly introduced into the organic law. 

" Does the provision, in regard to the reclamation of fugitive 
slaves, vest the power exclusively in the federal government? 

" This must be determined from the lano-uaa^e of the consti- 
tution, and the nature*of the power. 

" The language of the provision is general. It covers the 
whole ground, not in detail, but in principle. The States are 
inhibited from passing 'any law or regulation which shall dis- 
charge a fugitive slave from the service of his master;' and a 
positive duty is enjoined on them to deliver him up, *on claim 
of the party to whom his service may be due.' 

"The nature of the power shows that it must be exclusive. 

" It was designed to protect the rights of the master, and 
against whom ? Not against the State, nor the people of the 
State in which he resides; but against the people and the 
legislative action of other States where the fugitive from labor 
might be found. Under the confederation, the master had no 
legal means of enforcing his rights in a State opposed to 
slavery. A disregard of rights thus asserted was deeply felt 
in the South. It produced great excitement, and would have 



143 

led to results destructive to the Union. To avoid this, the 
constitutional guarantee was essential. 

" The necessity for this provision was found in the views and 
feelings of the people of the States opposed to slavery ; and 
who, under such an influence, could not be expected favorably 
to regard the rights of the master. Now, by whom is this 
paramount law to be executed? 

" It is contended that the power to execute it rests with the 
States. The law was designed to protect the rights of the 
slaveholder against the States opposed to those riirhts; and 
yet, by this argument, the effective power is in the hands of 
those on whom it is to operate. 

"This would produce a strange anomaly in the history of 
legislation. It would show an inexperience and folly in the 
venerable framers of the constitution, from which, of all public 
bodies that ever assembled, they were, perhaps, most exempt. 

" The clause of the constitution under consideration declares 
that no fugitive from labor shall be discharged from such labor, 
by any law or regulation of the State into which he may have 
fled. Is the State to judge of this? Is it left for the State to 
determine what effect shall be given to this and other parts of 
the provision ? 

" This power is not susceptible of division. It is a part of 
the fundamental law, and pervades the Union. The rule 
of action which it prescribes was intended to be the same in 
all the States. This is essential to the attainment of the objects 
of the law. If the effect of it depended, in any degree, upon 
the construction of a State by legislation or otherwise, its spirit, 
if not its letter, would be disregarded. This would not proceed 
from any settled determination in any State to violate the fun- 
damental rule, but from habits and modes of reasoning on the 
subject. Such is the diversity of human judgment, that oppo- 
site conclusions, equally honest, are often drawn from the same 
premises. It is, therefore, essential to the uniform efficacy of 
this constitutional provision that it should be considered, exclu- 
sively, a federal power. It is in its nature as much so as the 
power to regulate commerce, or that of foreign intercourse. 

"To give full effect to this provision, was legislation neces- 
sary? Congress, by the passage of the act of 1793, legislated 
on the subject, and this shows how this provision was con- 
strued shortly after its adoption : and the reasons which were 



144 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMOKE. 

deliberately considered, and which led to the passage of the 
act, show clearly that it was necessar}^ These reasons will be 
more particularly referred to under another head of the argu- 
ment. But looking only at the constitution, the propriety, if 
not the necessity, of legislation is seen. 

" The constitution provides that the fugitive from labor shall 
be dehvered up, on claim being made by the person entitled 
to such labor; but it is silent as to how and on whom this 
claim shall be made. The act of Congress provides for this 
defect and uncertainty, by establishing the mode of procedure. 

"It is contended, that the power to legislate on this subject 
is concurrently in the States and federal government. That 
the acts of the latter are paramount, but that the acts of the 
former must be regarded as of authority, until abrogated by 
the federal power. How a power exercised by one sovereignty 
can be called concurrent, which may be abrogated by another, 
I can not compreliend. A concurrent power, from its nature, 
I had supposed must be equal. If the federal government by 
legislating on the subject annuls all State legislation on the 
same subject, it must follow that the power is in the federal 
government and not in the State. 

" Taxation is a power common to a State and the general 
government, and it is exercised by each independently of the 
other. And this must be the character of all concurrent 
powers. 

" It is said that a power may be vested in the federal gov- 
ernment which remains dormant, and that in such case a State 
may legislate on the subject. In the case supposed, whence 
does the Legislature derive its power? Is it derived from the 
constitution of the State, or the constitution of the United 
States ? 

" If the power is given by the State constitution, it must 
follow that it may be exercised independently of the federal 
power; for it is presumed no one will sanction the doctrine 
that Congress, by legislation, may abridge the constitutional 
power of a State. 

" How can the power of the State be derived from the fed- 
eral constitution ? Is it assumed on the ground that Congress 
having the power have failed to exercise it ? Where is such 
an assumption to end? May it not be applied with equal 
force and propriety to the whole ground of federal legislation. 



THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. * 145 

excepting only the powers inhibited to the States ? Congress 
have not legislated upon a certain subject, but this does not 
show that they may not have duly considered it. Or, thev 
may have acted without exhausting the power. Now, in my 
judgment, it is illogical and unconstitutional to hold that in. 
either of these cases a State may legislate. 

" Is this a vagrant power of the State, like a floating land 
warrant, to be located on the first vacant spot that shall ha 
found? May a State occupy a fragment of federal power 
which has not been exercised, and, Hke a tenant at will, continue 
to occupy it until it shall have notice to quit? 

" No such power is derived by implication from the federal 
constitution. It defines the powers of the general government, 
and imposes certain restrictions and duties on the States. But 
beyond this it in no degree affects the powers of the States. 
The powers which belong to a State are exercised independent- 
ly. In its sphere of sovereignty it stands on an equality with 
the federal government, and is not subject to its control. It 
would be as dangerous as humiliating to the rights of a State, 
to hold that its legislative powers were exercised to any extent 
and under any circumstances, subject to the paramount action 
of Congress. Such a doctrine would lead to serious and dan- 
gerous conflicts of power. 

"The act of 1793 seems to cover the whole constitutional 
ground. The third section provides, 'That when a person held 
to labor in any State or territory of the United States, under 
the laws thereof, shall escape into any other of the said States 
or territories, the person to whom such labor or service may 
be due, his agent or attorney, is empowered to seize or arrest 
such fugitive from labor, and to take him or her before any 
judge of the circuit or district courts of the United States re- 
siding or being within the State, or before any magistrate of a 
county, city, or town corporate, wherein such seizure or arrest 
shall be made, and upon proof, to the satisfaction of such judge 
or magistrate, either by oral testimony or affidavit, &c., that 
the person so seized or arrested, doth, under the laws of the 
State or territory from which he or she fled, owe service or 
labor to the person claiming him or her, it shall be the duty 
of such judge or magistrate to give a certificate thereof to 
such claimant, his agent, or attorney, which shall be sufficient 



146 BIOGKAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

warrant for removing said fugitive to the State from which he 
or she fled.' 

"The fourth section imposes a penalty on any person who* 
shall obstruct or hinder such claimant, his agent, or attorney, 
tfec, or shall rescue such fugitive, when so arrested, &c. 

"It seems to be taken as a conceded point in the argument, 
that Congress had no power to impose duties on State officers, 
as provided in the above act. As a general principle this is 
true ; but does not the case under consideration form an ex- 
ception? Congress can no more regulate the jurisdiction of 
State tribunals, than a State can dehne the judicial power of 
the Union. The officers of each government are responsible 
only to the respective authorities under which they are com- 
missioned. But do not the clauses in the constitution in re- 
gard to fugitives from labor, and from justice, give Congress 
a power over State officers, on these subjects ? The power in 
both the cases is admitted or proved to be exclusively in the 
federal government. 

"The clause in the constitution preceding the one in relation 
to fugitives from labor, declares that, 'A person charged in 
any State with treason, felony, or other crime, who shall flee 
from justice, and be found in another State, shall, on demand 
of the executive authority of the State from which he fled, bo 
delivered up to be removed to the State having jurisdiction of 
the crime.' 

"In the first section of the act of 1793, Congress have pro- 
vided that on demand being made as above, 'it shall be the 
duty of the executive authority to cause the person demanded 
to be arrested,' <fec. 

" The constitutionality of this law, it is believed, has never 
been quesuoned. It has been obeyed by the governors of 
States, who have uniformly acknowledged its obligation. To 
some demands surrenders have not been made; but the refu- 
sals have, in no instance, been on the ground that the constitu- 
tion and act of Cono-ress were of no bindinor force? Other 
reasons have been assigned. 

"Now, if Congress may by legislation require this duty to 
be performed by the highest State officer, may they not on the 
same principle require appropriate duties in regard to the sur- 
render of fugitives from labor, by other State officers? Over 
these subjects the constitutional power is the same.. 



FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 147 

"In both cases the act of 1793 defines on what evidence 
the delivery shall be made. This was necessary, as the con- 
stitution is silent on the subject. The act provides that on 
claim being made of a fugitive from hibor, 'it shall be the duty 
of such judge or magistrate to give a certificate that the person 
claimed owes services to the claimant.' 

"The constitution requires ' that such person shall be dehv- 
ered up, on claim of the party to whom the service is due.' 
Here is a positive dut}^ imposed; and Congress have said in 
what mode this duty shall be performed. Had they not power 
to do so ? If the constitution was designed, in this respect, to 
require, not a negative but a positive duty on the State and 
the people of the State where the fugitive from labor may be 
found — of which, it would seem, there can be no doubt — it 
must be equally clear that Congress may prescribe in what 
manner the claim and surrender shall be made. I am, there- 
fore, brought to the conclusion that, although, as a gene|feil 
principle, Congress can not impose duties on State officers, yet 
in the cases of fugitives from labor and justice, they have the 
power to do so. 

"In the case of Martin's Lessee v. Hunter, 1 Wheat. Rep. 
304, this court says, 'The language of the constitution, is im- 
perative on the States as to the performance of many duties. 
It is imperative on the State legislatures to make laws pre- 
scribing the time, place, and manner of holding elections for 
senators and representatives, and for electors of President and 
Vice-president. And in these, as well as in other cases. Con- 
gress have a right to revise, amend, or supersede the laws 
which may be passed by the State legislatures.' 

" Now, I do not insist on the exercise of the federal power 
to the extent as here laid down. I go no farther than to say, 
that where the constitution imposes a positive duty on a State 
or its oflScers to surrender fugitives, that Congress may pre- 
scribe the mode of proof, and the duty of the State officers.'* 

The opinion from which we have made this extract was de- 
livered several years before the passage of the law of 185t>. 
The following quotation from an opinion of Judge M'Lean in 
a case which came before him in Ohio, in 1853, fully sustains 
the constitutionaUty of the act, for signing which Mr. Fillmore 



148 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

has been so fiercely denounced. Judge M'Lean's well known 
anti-slavery sympathies are a sufficient guarantee that he hag 
no bias in favor of the law whose constitutionality he defends. 
We quote from the fifth volume of M'Lean's Reports: 

"It is contended that the law authorizing the reclamation 
of fugitives from labor is unconstitutional ; . that the constitu- 
tion left the power with the States, and vested no power on 
the subject in the federal government 

"This argument has been sometimes advanced, and it may 
have been introduced into one or more political platforms. In 
regard to the soundness of this position, I will first refer to ju- 
dicial decisions. In the *case of Prigg v. The State of Penn- 
sylvania, 16 Peters' R. 539, the judges of the Supreme Court 
of the United States, without a dissenting voice, affirmed the 
d^trine, that this power was in the federal governments A 
majority of them held that it was exclusively in the general 
government. Some of the judges thought that a State might 
legislate in aid of the act of Congress, but it was held by no 
one of them, that the power could be exercised by a State, 
except in subordination of the federal power. 

"Every State court which has decided the question, has 
decided it in accordance with tile view of the Supreme Court. 
No respectable court, it is believed, has sustained the view 
that the power is with the State. Such an array of authority 
can scarcely be found in favor of the construction of any part 
of the constitution, which has ever been doubted. But this 
construction, sanctioned as it is by the entire judicial power, 
State as well as federal, has also the sanction of the legislative 
power. 

'"The constitution of the United States, it will be observed, 
was formed in 1787. Afterward it was submitted to the 
respective States for their ratification. The subject was not 
only largely discussed in the federal convention, but also in 
every State convention. No question has ever arisen, in re- 
gard to our federal relations, which was of equal importance 
to that of the adoption of the constitution; none in our politi- 
cal history was more thoroughly discussed. The men of 
that day may be emphatically said to have understood the 
constitution. 



FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 149 

" In a very few years after the constitution was adopted by 
the States, the fugitive act of 1793 was passed. That law is 
still in force, except where the act of 1850 contains repugnant 
provisions. In the Congress which enacted the act of 1793, it 
is believed, that some of the members had been members of 
the convention. They could not have been ignorant of the 
provision of that instrument. And by the passage of that act 
they exercised the power, as one that belonged to the federal 
government. Here is a force of authority, judicial and legis- 
lative, which can not be found on any other seriously litigated 
point in the constitution. 

" Such a weight of authority is not to be shaken. If the 
question is not to be considered authoritatively settled, what 
part of that instrument can ever be settled ? The surrender of 
fugitive slaves was a matter deeply interesting to the slave 
States. Under the confederation there was no provision for 
their surrender. On the principles of comity amongst the 
States the fugitives were delivered up ; at other times they 
were protected and defended. This state of things produced 
uneasiness and discontent in the slave States. A remedy of 
this evil, as it was called, was provided in the constitution. 

"An individual who puts his opinion, as to the exercise of 
this power, against the authority of the nation in its legislative 
and judicial action, must have no small degree of confidence in 
his own judgment. A few individuals in Massachusetts may 
have maintained, at one time, that the power was with the 
States; but such views were, it is' believed, long since aban- 
doned, but they are re-asserted now, more as a matter of ex- 
pediency than of principle. 

"But whether we look at the weight of authority against 
State power as asserted, or at the constitutional provision, we 
are led to the same result. The provision reads: 'No person 
held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, 
escaping into another, shall in consequence of any law or reg- 
ulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor; but 
shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such ser- 
vice may be due.' 

"This, in the first place, is a federal measure. It was adop- 
ted by the national convention, and was sanctioned as a federal 
law, by the respective States. It is the supreme law of the 
land. Now a provision which can not be enforced, and which 



150 BIOGRAPHY OF MTLLAED FILLMORE. 

has no penalty for its violation, is no law. The highly respect- 
able gentleman who read an ingenious argument in support 
of these views, is too good a theologian to contend that any 
rule of action which may be disregarded without incurring a 
penalty, can be law. It may be a recommendation, but it can 
not be a law. This was the great objection to the articles of 
confederation. There was no power to enforce its provisions. 
They were recommendatory, and without sanctions. 

"There is no regulation, divine or human, which can be called 
a law, without a sanction. Our first parents, in the garden, 
felt the truth of this. And it has been felt by violators of the 
divine or human laws throughout the history of our race. 

"The provision in the constitution is prohibitory and positive. 
It prohibits the States from liberating- slaves which escape into 
them, and it enjoins a duty to deliver up such fugitives on 
claim bemg made. The constitution vests no special power in. 
Congress to prohibit the first, or to enforce the observance of 
the second. Does it, therefore, follow that effect can be given 
to neither, if a State shall disregard it? 

"Suppose a State declares a slave who escapes into it shall 
be liberated, or that any one who shall assist in delivering him 
up shall be punished. If this power belongs to the States, 
and not to the federal government, these regulations would be 
legal, as within the exercise of their discretion. This is not an 
ideal case. The principle was involved in the Prigg case, and 
the Supreme Court held the act of the State unconstitutional 
and void. 

"It is admitted that there is no power in the federal govern- 
ment to force any legislative action on a State. But, if the 
constitution guarantees a right to the master of a slave, and 
that he shall be delivered up, the power is given to effectuate 
that right. If this be not so, the constitution is not what its 
framers supposed it to be. It was believed to be a fundamen- 
tal law of the Union. A federal law. A law to the States 
and to the people of the States. It says that the States shall 
not do certain things. Is this the form of giving advice or 
recommendation? It is the language of authority, to those 
who are bound to obey. If a State do the thing forbidden, its 
acts will be declared void. If it refuse to do that which is 
enjoyed, the federal government, being a government, has the 
means of executing it. 



FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 151 

"The constitution provides, 'that full faith shall be given to 
public acts, records, and judicial proceedinfrs,' of one State in 
ever}' other. If an individual chiiming this provision as a right, 
and a State court shall deny it, on a writ of error to the Su- 
preme Court of the Union, such judgment would be reversed. 
And the provision that, 'the citizens of each State shall be 
entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the sev- 
eral States.' Congress unquestionably may provide in what 
manner a right claimed under this clause, and denied by a 
State, may be enforced. And if a case can be raised under it, 
without any further statutory provisions, so as to present the 
point to the Supreme Court, the decision of a State court de- 
nying the right would be reversed. So a State is prohibited 
from passing a law that shall impair the obligations of a con- 
tract. Such a law the Supreme Court has declared void. In 
these cases, and in many others, where a State is prohibited 
from doing a thing, the remedy is given by a writ of error, 
under the legislation of Congress. The same principle applies 
in regard to fugitives from labor. 

"A fugitive from justice may be delivered up under a simi- 
lar provision in the constitution. It declares that, 'A person 
charged in any State with treason, felony, or other crime, who 
shall tiee from justice, and be found in another State, $hall, on 
demand of the executive authority of the State from which he 
fled, be deHvered up, to be removed to the State having juris- 
diction of the crime.* This is contained in the same section as 
the clause in relation to fugitives from labor, and they both 
stand upon the same principle. In both cases Congress has 
provided a mode in which effect shall be given to the provision. 
No one, it is believed, has doubted the constitutionality of the 
provision in regard to fugitives from justice. 

"The men who framed the constitution, were adequate to 
the great duties which devolved upon them. They knew that 
a general government was essential to preserve the fruits of the 
revolution. They understood the necessities of the country. 
The articles of confederation had been found as a rope of sand, 
in all matti^'s of cx)ntiict between the different States, and the 
people of the different States. Without a general government, 
commerce could not be regulated among the States, or with 
foreign nations; fugitives from labor could not be reclaimed; 
State boundaries could not be authoritatively established. 



152 BIOGKAPHT OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

"I am aware it has been stated, that the subject of slavery 
was not discussed in the convention, and that the reclamation 
of fugitives from labor was not, at that time, a subject of much 
interest. This is a mistake. It was a subject of deep and ex- 
citing interest, and without a provision on the subject no con- 
stitution could have been adopted. I speak from information 
received from the late Chief-Justice Marshall, who was one of 
the chief actors in that day, than whom no man then living 
was of higher authority. 

"The want of a general regulation on the subject of fugitives 
from justice and from labor was felt, and the above provisions 
in the constitution were intended as a remedy. It has provfcd 
'to be an adequate remedy as against fugitives from justice. In 
no instance, it is believed, has the constitutionality of this pro- 
vision been doubted. But the provision in relation to fugiiives 
from labor, resting upon the same principle, is now opposed. 

"If the introduction of this provision into the fundamental 
law of the Union was not intended to operate as the law of the 
Union — if it was recommendatory in its character only — it 
was useless. The power to surrender fugitives from labor, 
under the confederacy, was with each State. It could be done, 
or refused,* at the discretion of the State. Did the framers of 
the constitution intend to leave tliis matter as it was under the 
confederation? The provision introduced shows an intention 
to make some provision on the subject. But by the argument, 
it is said, the provision made left the power with the States, 
and did not vest it in the general government. The answer to 
this is, it was in the States before the provision, and on this 
view, it added nothing to the power of the States. If such be 
the true construction of the provision, it fixes an act of con- 
summate folly on the framers of the constitution, and on the 
members of the State conventions who adopted it. In laying 
the foundation of a general government, they incorporated 
into the fundamental law a useless provision, and omitted to 
provide for an emergency which was felt and complained of in 
one half of the States. The men of that day were not likely 
to be guilty of such an omission. They understood the federal 
and State powers too well, not to know that without some ef- 
fective provision on this subject, the superstructure which they 
were about to rear would soon be overthrown. These were 
the circumstances under which the constitution was framed 



FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 163 

and adopted. With the abstract principles of slavery, courts 
called to administer this law have nothing to do. It is for the 
people, who are sovereign, and their representatives, in making 
constitutions, and in the enactment of laws, to consider the 
laws of nature, and the immutable principles of right. This 
is a field which judges can not explore. Their action is lim- 
ited to conventional rights. They look to the law, and to the 
law only. A disregard of this, by the judicial powers, would 
undermine and overturn the social compact. If the law be 
injudicious or oppressive, let it be repealed or modified. But 
this is a power which the judiciary can not reach. 

''The citizen of a slave State has a right, under the consti- 
tution arfd laws of the Union, to have the fugitive slave * deliv- 
ered up on claim being made,' and no State can defeat or 
obstruct this consdtutional right. The judiciary power of the 
Union has the primary or eventual power to determine all 
rights arising under the constitution. This will not be contro- 
verted by any legal mind, which has properly investigated the 
great principles of the constitution. And the question now 
made is not, in principle, different from a numerous class of 
cases arising under powers prohibited to the States. 

"The w rthy and estimable gentleman who read an argu- 
ment on this occasion, in commenUng on the cases covered»by 
the fugitive law, embraced all cases of contract, and even that 
between a minister and his congregation. He supposes if the 
minister should leave his congregation before his stipulated 
engagement had transpired, that he was liable to be arrested 
and returned to his congregation under the fugitive law. 

*' This is a case, under this law, which no one before has 
supposed to be embraced by it. And if the law did cover 
such a case, it would be the most dithcult to carry out of any 
other which has been imagined. If the minister could be re"- 
turned, neither the court nor the congregation could compel 
him to preach. JNfo profession or chiss of men would be less 
hkely to do anything on compulsion. 

"But the law applies o no case of contract. Where the 
parties to the agreement are capable of making a contract, the ' 
remedy for a breach of it is by action at law. In the case of 
slaves and of apprentices, there is no remedy against the indi- 
vidual who absconds, by an action. 

''Various objections are stated to the fugitive slave law of 
7* 



164: BIOGKA^HY OF MILLARD FILLMOKE. 

1850. The duties of the commissioners, the penalties inflicted, 
the bribe secured to the commissioner, for remanding the fugi- 
tive, are all objected to as oppressive and unconstitutional. In 
regard to the tive dollars, in addition, paid to the commissioner, 
where the fugitive is remanded to the claimant, in all fairness, 
it can not be considered as a bribe, or as so intended by Con- 
gress; but as a compensation to the commissioner for making 
a statement of the case, which includes the facts proved, and 
to which his certificate is annexed. In cases where the wit- 
nesses are numerous, and the investigation takes up several 
days, five dollars would scarcely be a compensation for the 
statement required. Where the fugitive is discharged, no 
statement is necessary. 

"The powers of the commissioner, or the amount of the 
penalties of- the act, are not involved in this inquiry. If there 
be an unconstitutional provision in an act, that does not affect 
any other part of the act. But I by no means intimate that 
any part of the act referred to is in conflict with the constitu- 
tion. I only say that the objections made to it do not belong 
to the case under consideration. 

"The act of 1850, except by repugnant provisions, did not 
repeal the act of 1793. The objection that no jury is given 
dotft iipply to both acts. From my experience in trying nu- 
merous actions for damages against persons who obstructed an 
arrest of fugitives from labor, or aided in their escape, I am 
authorized to say, that the rights of the master would be safe 
before a jury. I recollect an instance where a strong anti- 
slavery man, called an abolitionist, was on the jury in a case 
for damages, but who, being sworn to find as the evidence and 
the law required, agreed to a verdict for the plaintiff. He 
rightly determined that his own opinions could not govern him 
in deciding a controversy between parties, but that under his 
oath he was bound by the law and the evidence of the case. 

"It was in the power of Congress to give a jury in cases 
like the present, but the law contains no such provision, 
and the question raised is, whether the act without it is con- 
stitutional. 

"This question has been largely discussed in Congress, in 
the public press, and in conventions of the people. It is not 
here raised as a question of expediency or policy, but of power. 
In that aspect only is it to be considered. 



FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. ' 155 

"The act of 1793 has been in operation about sixt}^ years. 
During that whole time it has been executed as occasion re- 
quired, and it is not known that any court, judge, or other 
officer has held the act, in this, or in any other respect, uncon- 
stitutional. This long course of decision, on a question so 
exciting as to call f(jrth the sympathies of the people, and the 
astuteness of lawyers, is no unsatisfactory evidence that the 
construction is coirect. 

"Under the constitution and act of Congress, the inquiry is 
not strictly whether the fugitive be a slave or a freeman, but 
whether he owe service to the claimant. This would be the 
precise question in the case of an apprentice. In such a case 
the inquiry would not be, whether the master had treated the 
apprentice so badly as to entitle him to his discharge. Such 
a question would, more probably, arise under the indenture 
of apprenticeship, and the laws under which it was executed. 
And if the apprentice be remanded to the service of his mas- 
ter, it would in no respect affect his right to a discharge^ where 
he is held, for the cruelty of his master or any other ground. 

"The same principle applies to fugitives from labor. It is 
true in such cases evidence is heard that lie is a freeman. 
His freedom may be established, by acts done or suffered by 
his master, not necessarily within the jurisdiction where he is 
held as a slave. Such an inquiry may be made, as it is re- 
quired by the justice of the case. But on whatever ground 
the fugitive may be remanded, it can not, legally, operate 
against his right to liberty. That right when presented to a 
court in a slave State, lias, generally, been acted upon with 
fairness and impartiality. Exceptions to this, if there be 
exceptions, would seem to have arisen on the claims of heirs 
or creditors, which are governed by local laws, with which 
the people of the other States are not presumed to be ac- 
quainted." 



156 BIOGKAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMORE. 



CHAPTER X. 

FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 

Mr. Fillmore was suddenly called to the presidency while 
Congress was in session, and amid the preparations for the 
funeral of President Taylor. These circumstances prevented 
his delivering an inaugural address. He therefore took occa- 
sion- in his first annual message, at the opening of the next 
session of Congress, to promulgate some general principles by 
which he would be governed in his administration of the gov- 
ernment. This message is so admirable in style, so truly na- 
tional in its spirft, so statesmanlike in its recommendations, and, 
compared with most documents of the kind, is such a model 
of brevity and directness, that we copy it without abndgm(*nt: 

''Felloiv- Citizens of the Senate, and of the House of Repre- 
sentatives: — Being suddenly called, in the midst of the last 
session of Congress, by a painful dispensation of Divine Prov- 
idence, to the responsible station which I now hold, I contented 
myself with such communications to the legislature as the exi- 
gency of the moment seemed to require. The country was 
shrouded in mourning for the loss of its venerated chief magis- 
trate, and all hearts were penetrated with grief. Neither the 
time nor the occasion appeared to require or to justify, on my 
part, any general expression of political opinions, or any an- 
nouncement of the principles which would govern me in the 
discharge of the duties to the perfojmance of which I had 
been so unexpectedly called. I trust, therefore, that it may 
not be deemed inappropriate, if I avail myself of this opportu- 
nity of the re-assembling of Congress, to make known my sen- 
timents in a general manner, in regard to the policy which 



FIKST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 157 

ought to be pursued by the government, both in its intercourse 
with foreign nations, and in its management and administration 
of internal affairs. 

" Nations, like individuals in a state of nature, are equal and 
independent, possessing certain rights, and owing certain duties 
to each other, arising from their necessary and unavoidable 
relations; which rights and duties there is no common human 
authority to protect and enforce. Still, they are rights and 
duties, binding in morals, in conscience, and in honor, although 
there is no tribunal to which an injured party can appeal, but 
the disinterested judgment of mankind, and ultimately the 
arbitrament of the sword. 

" Among the acknowledged rights of nations is that which 
each possesses of establishing that form of government which it 
may deem most conducive to the happiness and prosperity of 
its own citizens; of changing that form, as circumstances may 
require; and. of managing its internal afiairs according to its 
own will. The people of the United States claim this right 
fur themselves, and they readily concede it to others. Hence 
it becomes an imperative duty not to interfere in the govern- 
ment or internal policy of other nations; and, although we may 
syTnpalhize vrilh the unfortunate or the oppressed, everywhere, 
in their struggles for freedom, our principles forbid us from 
taking any part in such foreign contests. We make no wars 
to promote or to prevent successions to thrones ; to maintain 
any theory of a balance of power ; or to suppress the actual 
government which any country chooses to establish for itself. 
We instigate no revolutions, nor suffer any hostile military ex- 
peditious to be titled out in the United States to invade the 
territory or provinces of a friendly nation. The great law of 
morality ought to, have a national, as well as a personal and 
individual, application. We should act toward other nations 
as we wish them to act toward us; and justice and conscience 
should form the rule of conduct between governments, instead 
of mere power, self-interest, or the desire of aggrandizement. 
To maintain a strict neutrality in foreign wars, to cultivate 
friendly relations, to reciprocate every noble and generous act, 
and to perform .punctually and scrupulously every treaty obli- 
gauon — these are the duties which we owe to other States, 
and by the performance of which we best entitle ourselves to 
like treatment from them ; or if that, in any case, bo refused, 



158 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

we can enforce our own rights with justice and with a clear 
conscience. 

'• In our domestic policy, the constitution will be my guide ; 
and in questions of doubt, I shall look for its interpretation to 
the judicial decisions of that tribunal which was established to 
expound it, and to the usage of the government, sanctioned by ^ 
the acquiescence of the country. I regard all its provisions as 
equally binding. In all its parts it is the will of the people, 
expressed in the most solemn form, and the constituted author- 
ities are but agents to carry that will into effect. Every power 
which it has granted is to be exercised for the public good ; 
but no pretense of utility, no honest conviction, even, of what 
might be expedient, can justify the assumption of any power 
not granted. The powers conferred upon the government and 
their distribution to the several departments, are as clearly ex- 
pressed in that sacred instrument as the imperfection of human 
lano-uao-e will allow; and I deem it my first duty, not to ques- 
tion its wisdom, add to its provisions, evade its requirements, 
or nullify its commands. 

"Upon you, fellow-citizens, as the representatives of the 
States and the people, is wisely devolved the legislative power. 
I shall comply with my duty, in laying before you, from time 
to time, any information calculated to enable you to discharge 
your high and responsible trust, for ihe benefit of our common 
constituents. 

" My opinions will be frankly expressed upon the leading 
subjects of legislation ; and if, which I do not anticipate, any 
act should pass the two Houses of Congress which should ap- 
pear'to me unconstitutional, or an encroachment on the just 
powers of other departments, or with provisions hastily adopted, 
and likely to produce consequences injurious and unforeseen, I 
should not shrink from the duty of returning it to you, with my 
reasons, for your further consideration. Beyond the due per- 
formance of these constitutional obligations, both my respect 
for the legislature and my sense of propriety will restrain mo 
from any attempt to control or influence your proceedings. 
With you is the power, the honor, and the responsibility of 
the legislation of the country. 

" The government of the United States is a limited govern- 
ment. It is confined to the exercise of powers expressly 
granted, and such others as may be necessary for carrying 



FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 159 

those powers into effect; and it is at all times an especial duty 
to guard against any infringement on the just rights of the 
States. Over the objects and subjects intrusted to Congress, 
its legislative authority is supreme. But here that authoritv 
ceases, and every citizen who truly loves the constitution, and 
desires the continuance of its existence and its blessings, will 
resolutely and firmly resist any interference in those domestic 
affairs which the constitution has clearly and unequivocally 
left to the exclusive authority of the States. And every such 
citizen will also deprecate useless irritation among the several 
members of the Union, and all reproach and crimination tend- 
ing to alienate one portion of the country from another. The 
beauty of our system of government consists, and its safety and 
durability must consist, in avoiding mutual collisions and en- 
croachments, and in the regular separate action of all, while 
each is revolving in its own distinct orbit. 

" The constitution has made it the duty of the President to 
take care that the laws be faithfully executed. In a govern- 
ment like ours, in which all laws are passed by a majority of 
the represeHtatives of the people, and these representatives are 
chosen for such short periods, that any injurious or obnoxious 
law can very soon be repealed, it would appear unlikely that 
any great numbers should be found ready to resist the execu- 
tion of the laws. But it must be borne in mind that the coun- 
try is extensive, that there may be local interests or prejudices 
rendering a law odious in one part, which is not so in another, 
and that the thoughtless and inconsiderate, misled by their 
passions or their imaginations, may be induced madly to resist 
such laws as they disapprove. Such persons should recollect 
that, without law there can be no real practical liberty ; that, 
when law is trampled under foot, tyranny rules, whether it 
appears in the form of a military despotism or of popular vio- 
lence. The law is the only sure protection of the weak, and 
the only efficient restraint upon the strong. When impartially 
and faithfully administered, none is beneath its protection, and 
none above its control. You, gentlemen, and the country, may 
be assured, that to the utmost of my ability, and to the extent 
of the power vested in me, I shall at all times, and in all places, 
take care that the laws be faithfully executed. In the dis- 
charge of this duty, solemnly imposed upon me by the consti- 
tution, and by my oath of 'office, I shall shrink from no 



160 BIOGBAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMORE. 

responsibility, and shall endeavor to meet events as they may- 
arise, with firmness, as well as with prudence and discretion. 

"The appointing power is one of the most delicate with 
which the executive is invested. I regard it as a sacred trust, 
to be exercised with the sole view of advancing the prosperity 
and happiness of the people. It shall be my effort to elevate 
the standard of official employment, by selecting for places of 
importance individuals fitted for the posts to which they are 
assigned, by their known integrity, talents, and virtues. In so 
extensive a country, with so great a population, and where few 
persons appointed to office can be known to the appointing 
power, mistakes will sometimes unavoidably happen, and un- 
fortunate appointments be made, notwithstanding the greatest 
care. In such cases, the power of removal may be properly 
exercised; and neglect of duty or malfeasance in office will be 
no more tolerated in individuals appointed by myself than ia 
those appointed by others. 

" I am happy in being able to say that no unfavorable change 
in our foreign relations has taken place since the message at 
the opening of the last session of Congress. We are at peace 
with all nations, and we enjoy in an eminent degree the bless- 
ings of that peace, in a prosperous and growing commerce, and 
in all the forms of amicable national intercourse. The unex- 
ampled growth of the country, the present amount of its pop- 
ulation, and its ample means of self-protection, assure for it the 
respect of all nations, while it is trusted that its character for 
justice, and a regard to the rights of other States, will cause 
that respect to be readily and cheerfully paid. 

" A convention was negotiated between the United States 
and Great Britain, in April last, for facilitating and protecting 
the construction of a ship canal between the Atlantic and Pa- 
cific Oceans, and for other purposes. This instrument has 
since been ratified by the contracting parties, the exchange of 
ratifications has been effected, and proclamation thereof has 
been duly made. 

" hi addition to the stipulations contained in this convention, 
two other objects remain to be accomplished between the con- 
tracting powers. 

" First, the designation and establishment of a free port at 
each end of the can;tl. 

" Second, an agreement fixing the distance from the shore 



FIKST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 161 

within which belligerent maritime operations shall not be 
carried on. On these points ihere is little doubt that the two 
governments will come to an understanding. 

"The company of citizens of the United States who have 
acquired from the State of Nicaragua the privilege of con- 
structing a ship canal between the two oceans, through the 
territory of that State, have made progress in their preliminary 
arrangements. The treaty between the United States and 
Great Briiain, of the 19th of April last, above referred to, 
being now in operation, it is to be hoped .that the guarantees 
which it offers will be sufficient to secure the completion of the 
work with all practicable expedition^ It is obvious that this 
result would be indefinitely postponed, if any other than peace- 
ful measures, for the purpose of harmonizing conflicting claims 
to territory in that quarter, should be adopted. It will conse- 
quently be my endeavor to cause any further negotiations on 
the part of this government, which may be requisite for this 
purpose, to be so conducted as to bring them to a speedy and 
successful close. 

" Some unavoidable delay has occurred, arising from distance 
and the difficulty of intercourse between this government and 
that of Nicaragua; but, as intelligence has just been received 
of the appointment of an Envoy Extraordinary and Minister 
Plenipotentiary of that government to reside at Washington, 
whose arrival may soon be expected, it is hoped that no fur- 
ther impediments will be experienced in the prompt transac- 
tion of business between the two governments. 

" Citizens of the United States have undertaken the connec- 
tion of the two oceans by means of a railroad across the Isthmus 
of Tehuantepec, under grants of the Mexican government to 
a citizen of that republic. It is understood that a thorough 
survey of the course of the communication is in preparation, 
and there is every reason to expect that it will be prosecuted 
with characteristic energy, especially when that government 
shall have consented to such stipulations with the government 
of the United States as may be necessary to impart a feeling 
of security to those who may embark their property in the 
enterprise. Negotiations are pending for the accomplishment 
of that object^ and a hope is confidently entertained that, when 
the government of Mexico shall become duly sensible of the 
advantages which that country can not fail to derive from the 



1G2 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

work, and learn . that the government of the United States 
d-esires that the right of sovereignty of Mexico in the isthmus 
shall remain unimpaired, the stipulations referred to will be 
agreed to with alacrity. 

" By the last advices from Mexico it would appear, however, 
that that government entertains strong objections to some of 
the stipulations which the parties concerned in the project 
of the railroad deem necessary for their protection and security. 
Further consideration, it is to be hoped, or some modification 
of terms, may yet reconcile the differences existing between 
the two governments in this respect. 

" Fresh instructions have recently been given to the Minister 
of the United Stales in Mexico, who is prosecuting the subject 
with promptitude and ability. 

" Although the negotiations with Portugal, for the payment 
of claims of citizens of the United Stales against that govern- 
ment, have not yet resulted in a formal treaty, yet a proposi- 
tion made by the government of Portugal for the Hnal 
adjustment and payment of those claims, has recently been 
accepted on the part of the United States. It gives me pleas- 
ure to say that ^Ir. Clay, to whom the negotiation on the part 
of the United States had been entrusted, discharged the duties 
of his appointment with ability and discretion, acting always 
within the instructions of his government. 

"It is expected that a regular convention will be immediately 
negotiated for carrying the agreement between the two gov- 
ernments into effect. 

"The commissioner appointed under the act of Congress for 
carrying into effect the convention with Brazil, of the '27th of 
January, 1849, has entered upon the performance of the duties 
imposed upon him by that act. It is hoped that those duties 
may be completed within the time which it prescribes. The 
documents, however, which the imperial government, by the 
third article of the convention, stipulates to furnish to the gov- 
ernment of the United States, have not yet been received. 
As it is presumed that those documents will be essential for 
the cowect disposition of the claims, it may become necessary 
for Congress to extend the period limited for the duration of 
the commission. The sum stipulated by the fourth article of 
the convention to be paid to this government has ^en 
received. * 



FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 163 

"The collection in the ports of the United States of discrim- 
inating duties upon the vessels of Chili and their cargoes, has 
been suspended, pursuant to the provisions of the act of Con- 
gress of the 2,4th of May, 1828. It is to be hoped that this 
measure will impart a fresh impulse to the commerce between 
the two countries, which, of late, and especially since our ac- 
quisition of California, has, to the mutual advantage of the 
parties, been much augmented. 

"Peruvian guano has become so desirable an article to the 
agricultural interest of the United States, that it is the duty 
of the government to employ all the means properly in its 
power for the, purpose of cau'sing that article to be imported 
into the country at a reasonable price. Nothing will be omit- 
ted on my part toward accomplishing this desirable end. I 
am persuaded that in removing any restraints on this traffic, 
the Peruvian government will promote its own best interests, 
while it will afford a proof of a friendly disposition toward tliis 
country, which will be duly appreciated. 

"The treaty between the United States and His Majesty the 
King of the Hawaiian Islands, which has recently been made 
pubhc, will, it is believed, have a beneficial effect upon the re- 
lations between the two countries. 

**The relations between those parts of the Island of St. Do- 
mingo, which were formerly colonies of Spain and France, 
respectively, are still in an unsettled condition. The proximity 
of that island to the United States, and the delicate questions 
involved in the existing controversy there, render it desirable 
that it should be permanently and speedily adjusted. The 
interests of humanity and of general commerce also demand 
this; and, as intimations of the same sentiment have been re- 
ceived from other governments, it is hoped that some plan may 
soon be devised to effect the object in a manner likely to give 
general satisfaction. The government of the United States 
will not fail, by the exercise of all proper friendly offices, to do 
all in its power to put an end to the destructive war which has 
raged between the different parts of the island, and to secure 
to them both the benefits of peace and commerce. 

"I refer you to the report of the Secretary of the Treasury 
for a detailed statement of the finances. 

"The total receipts into the treasury, for the year ending 
30th of June last, were forty-seven millions four hundred and 



164: BIOGKAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

twenty-one thousand seven hundred and forty-eight dollars 
and ninety cents, ($47,421,748 90.) 

"The total expenditures during the same period were forty- 
three million two thousand one hundred and sixty-eight dol- 
lars and ninety cents, ($43,002,168 00.) 

"The public debt has been reduced, since the last annual 
report from the treasury department, four hundied and ninety- 
five thousand two hundred and se/enty-six dollars and seventy- 
nine cents, ($495,276 79.) . 

" Hy the nineteenth section of the act of 28th January, 1847, 
the proceeds of the sales of the public lands were pledged for 
,the interest and principal of the public debt. The great 
amount of those lands subsequently granted by Congress for 
military bounties, will, it is believed, very nearly supply the 
public demand for several years to come, and but little reliance 
can, therefore, be placed on that hitherto fruitful source of 
revenue. 

"Aside from the permanent annual expenditures, which have 
necessarily largely increased, a portion of the public debt, 
amounting to eight million seventy-tive thousand nine hundred 
and eighty-six dollars and fifty-nine cents, ($8,075,986 59,) 
must be provided for within the next two fiscal years. It is 
most desirable that these accruing demands should be met 
without resorting to new loans. 

"All experience has demonstrated the wisdom and policy of 
raising a large portion of revenue for the support of govern- 
ment from duties on goods imported. The power to lay these 
duties is unquestionable, and its chief object, of course, is to 
replenish the treasury. But if, in doing this, an incideniai 
advantage may be gained by encouraging the industry of our 
own citizens, it is our duty to avail ourselves of that advantage. 

'•A duty laid upon an article which can not be produced in 
this country — such as tea or cotfee — adds to the cost of the 
article, and is chiefly or wholly paid by the consumer. But a 
duty laid upon an article which may be produced here, stim- 
ulates the skill and industry of our own country to produce 
the same article, which is brought into the market in competi- 
tion with the foreign article, and the importer is thus compelled 
to reduce his price to that at which the domestic article can be 
sold, thereby throwing a part of the duty upon the producer 
of the foreign article. The coatiauauce of this process creates 



FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 165 

the skill, and invites the capital, which finally enables us to 
produce the article much cheaper than it could have been pro- 
cured from abroad, thereb}^ benefitting both the producer and 
the consumer at home. The consequence of this is, that the 
artisan and the agriculturalist are brought together, each 
affords a ready market for the produce of the other, the whole 
country becomes prosperous, and the ability to produce every 
necessary of life renders us independent in war as well as 
in peace. 

"A high tariff can never be permanent It will cause dis- 
satisfaction and will be changed. It excludes competition, and 
thereby invites the investment of capital in manufactures to 
such excess, that when changed it brings distress, bankruptcy, 
and ruin, upon all who have been misled by its faithless pro- 
tection. What the manufacturer wants, is uniformity and per- 
manency, that he may feel a confidence that he is not to be 
ruined by sudden changes. But to make' a tariff uniform and 
permanent, it is not only necessary that the law should not be 
altered, but that the duty should not fluctuate. To effect this, 
all duties should be specific, wherever the nature of the article 
is such as to admit of it. Ad valorem duties fluctuate with 
the price, and offer strong temptations to fraud, and perjury. 
•Specific duties, on the contrary, are equal and uniform in all 
ports, and at all times, and offer a strong inducement to the 
importer to bring the best article, as he pays no more duty 
upon that than upon one of inferior quality. I therefore 
sLiongly recommend a modification of the present tariff", which 
has prostrated some of our most important and necessary man- 
ufactures, and that specific duties be imposed sufficient to raise 
the requisite revenue, making such discrimination in favor of 
the industrial pursuits of our own country as to encourage 
home production, without excluding foreion competition. It is 
also important that an unfortunate provision in the present 
tariff, which imposes a much higher duty upon the raw ma- 
terial that enters into our manufactures than upon the manu- 
factured article, should be remedied. 

*'The papers accompanying the report of the Secretary of 
the Treasury will disclose frauds attempted upon the revenue, 
in variety and amount so great, as to justify the conclusion that 
it is impossible, under any system of ad valorem duties levied 
upon the foreign cost or value of the article, to secure an 



166 BIOGRAPnY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

honest observance and an effectual administration of the laws. 
The fraudulent devices to evade the law, which have been de- 
tected by the vigilance of the appraisers, leave no room to 
doubt that similar impositions not discovered, to a large amount, 
have been successfully practiced since the enactment of the 
law now in force. This state of things has already had a pre- 
judicial influence upon those engaged in foreign commerce. 
It has a tendency to drive the honest trader from the business 
of importing, and to throw that important branch of employ- 
ment into the hands of unscrupulous and dishonest men, who 
are alike regardless of law and the obligations of an oath. By 
these means the plain intentions of Congress, as expressed in 
the law, are daily defeated. Every motive of policy and duty, 
therefore, impel me to ask the earnest attention of Congress 
to this subject. If Congress should deem it unwise to attempt 
any important changes in the system of levying duties at this 
session, it will become indispensable to the protection of the 
revenue that such remedies, as in the judgment of Congress may 
mitigate the evils complained of, should be at once applied. 

"As before stated, specitic duties would, in my opinion, afford 
the most perfect remedy for this evil; but, if you should not 
concur in this^ view, then, as a partial remedy, I beg leave re- 
spectfully to recommend that, instead of taking the invoice of 
the article abroad as a means of determining its value here, 
the correctness of which invoice it is in many cases impossible 
to verify, the law be so changed as to require a home valuation 
or appraisal, to be regulated in such manner as to give, as far 
as practicable, uniformity in the several ports. 

"There being no mint in California, I am informed that the 
laborers in the mines are compelled to dispose of their gold 
dust at a large discount. This appears to me to be a heavy 
and unjust tax upon the labor of those employed in extracting 
this precious metal ; and I doubt not you will be disposed, at 
the earliest period possible, to relieve them from it by the es- 
tablishment of a mint. In the meantime, as an assayer's office 
is established there, I would respectfully submit for your con- 
sideration the propriety of authorizing gold bullion, which has 
been assayed and stamped, to be received in payment of gov- 
ernment dues. I can not conceive that the treasury would 
suff'er any loss by such a provision, which will at once raise 
bullion to its par value, and thereby save, (if I am rightly 



FIRST ANNUAL [MESSAGE. 167 

informed,) many millions of dollars to the laborers which are now 
paid in brokerag-e to convert this precious metal into available 
funds. This discount upon their hard earnings is a haiixy tax, 
and every effort should be made by the government to relieve 
ihem from so great a burden. 

" More than three-fourths of our population are engaged iu 
the cultivation of the soil. The commercial, manufacturing, 
and navigating interests are all, to a great extent, dependent 
on the agricultural. It is, therefore, the most important in- 
terest of the nation, and has a just claim to the fostering care 
and protection of the government, so far as they can be ex- 
tended consistently with the provisions of the constitution. As 
this can not be done by the ordinary modes of legislation, I 
respectfully recommend the establishment of an Agricultural 
Bureau, to be charged with the duty of giving to this leadino- 
branch of American industry the encouragement which it so 
well deserves. In view of the immense mineral resources of 
our country, provision should also be made for the employment 
of a competent mineralogist and chemist, who should be re- 
quired, under the direction of the head of the bureau, to collect 
specimens of the various minerals of our country, and to ascer- 
tain, by careful analysis, their respective elements and proper- 
ties, and their adaptation to useful purposes. He should also 
be required to examine and report upon the quahties of differ- 
ent soils, and the manures best calculated to" improve their 
productiveness. By publishing the results of such experiments, 
with suitable explanations, and by the collection and distribu- 
tion of rare seeds and plants, with instructions as to the best 
system of cultivjition, much may be done to promote this great 
national interest. 

"In compliance with the act of Congress, passed on the 23d 
of May, 1850, providing, among other things, for taking the 
seventh census, a superintendent was appointed, and all other 
measures adopted which were deemed necessary to ensure the 
prompt and faithful performance of that duty. The appro- 
priation already made will, it is believed, be sufficient to defray 
the whole expense of the work; but further legislation may be 
necessary in regard to the compensation of some of the marshals 
of the territories. It will also be proper to make provision, by 
law, at an early day, for the publication of such abstracts of 
the returns as the public interests may require. 



168 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

"The unprecedented growth of our territories on the Pacific 
in wealth and population, and the consequent increase of their 
social and commercial relations with the Atlantic States, seem 
to render it the duty of the government to use all its constitu- 
tional power to improve the means of intercourse with them. 
The importance of opening 'a line of communication, the best 
and most expeditious of which the nature of the country will 
admit,' between the valley of the Mississippi and the Pacific, 
was brouoht to your notice by my predecessor, in his annual 
messaoe; and as the reasons which he presented in favor of 
the measure still exist in full force, 1 beg leave to call your 
attention to them, and to repeat the recommendations then 
made by him. 

"The uncertainty which exists in regard to the validity of 
land titles in California is a subject which demands your early 
consideration. Large bodies of land in that State are claimed 
under grants said to have been made by authority of the 
Spanish and Mexican governments. Many of these have not 
been perfected, others have been revoked, and some are be- 
lieved to be fraudulent. But until they shall have been judi- 
cially investigated, they will continue to retard the settlement 
and improvement of the country. I, therefore, respectfully 
recommend that provision be made by law, for the appointment 
of commissioners to examine all such claims with a view to 
their final adjustment. 

"I also beg leave to call your attention to the propriety of 
extending, at an early day, our system of land laws, with such 
modifications as may be necessary, over the State of California 
and the territories of Utah and New Mexico. The mineral 
lands of Cahfornia will, of course, form an exception to any 
general system which may be adopted. Vaiious methods of 
disposing of them have been suggested. I was at first inclined 
to favor the system of leasing, as it seemed to promise the 
largest revenue to the government and to atford the best se- 
curity against monopolies: but further reflection, and our 
experience in leasing the lead mines and selling lands upon 
credit, have brought my mind to the conclusion that there 
would be great difficulty in collecting the rents, and that the 
relation of debtor and creditor, between the citizens and the 
government, would be attended with many mischievous eon- 
sequences. I, therefore, recommend that, instead of retaining 



FIKST A2»^NUAL MESSAGE. 169 

the mineral lands under the permanent control of the govern- 
ment, they be divided into small parcels and sold, under such 
restrictions, as to quantity and time, as will insure the best 
price, and guard most effectually against combinations of capi- 
talists to obtain monopolies. 

•'The annexation of Texas and the acquisition of CaUfornia 
and New Mexico have given increased importance to our In- 
dian relations. The various tribes brought under our jurisdic- 
tion by these enlargements of our boundaries are estimated 
to embrace a population of one hundred and twenty-four 
thousand. 

"Texas and New Mexico are surrounded by powerful tribes 
of Indians, who are a source of constant terror and annoyance 
to the inhabitants. Separating into small predatory bands, and 
always mounted, they overrun the country, devastating farms, 
destroying crops, driving off whole herds of cattle, and occa- 
sionuhy murdering the inhabitants or carrying them into cap- 
tivity. The great roads leading into the country are infested 
with them, whereby traveling is rendered extremely dangerous, 
and immigration is almost entirely arrested. The Mexican 
frontier, which, by the eleventh article of the treaty of Guad- 
alupe Hidalgo, we are bound to protect against the Indians 
within our border, is exposed to these incursions equally with 
our own. The military force stationed in that country (al- 
though forming a large proportion of the army) is represented 
as entirely inadequate to our own protection and the fulfillment 
of our treaty stipulations with Mexico. The principaldeticien- 
cy is in cavalry ; and I recommend that Congress should, at as 
*early a period as practicable, provide for the raising of one or 
more regiments of mounted men. 

"For further suggestions on this subject, and others con- 
nected with our domestic interests, and the defense of our 
frontier, I refer you to the reports of the Secretary of the 
Interior and of the Secretary of War. 

"I commend also to your favorable consideration the sug- 
gestion contained in the last mentioned report, and in the letter 
of the general-in-chief, relative to the establishment of an asy- 
lum for the relief of disabled and destitute soldiers. This 
subject appeals so strongly to your sympathies that it would 
be supertiuous in me to say anything more than barely to 
express my cordial approbation of the proposed objects 
8 



170 BIOUKAPHY OF MILLAKD FiLLMOiiE. 

"The navy continues to give protection to our commerce 
and other national interests in the different quarters of the 
globe, and, with the exception of a single steamer on the north- 
ern lakes, the vessels in commission are distributed in six dif- 
ferent squadrons. 

" The report of the head of that department will exhibit the 
services of these squadrons, and of the several vessels em- 
ployed in each during the past year. It is a source of gratifi- 
cation that, \vhile they have been constantly prepared for any 
hostile emergency, they have everywhere met with the respect 
and courtesy, due as well to the dignity as to the peaceful 
dispositions and just purposes of the nation. 

"The two brigan tines accepted by the government from a 
generous citizen of New York, and placed under the command 
of an officer of the navy, to proceed to the Arctic seas in quest 
of the British commander, Sir John Franklin, and his compan- 
ions, in compliance with the act of Congress, approved in May 
last, had, when last heard from, penetrated into a high north- 
ern latitude ; but the success of this noble and humane enter- 
prise is yet uncertain. 

"I invite your attention to the view of our present naval 
establishment and resources presented in the report of the 
Secretary of the Navy, and the suggestions therein made for 
its improvement, together with the naval policy recommended 
for the security of our Pacific coast, and the protection and 
extension of our commerce vath Eastern Asia. Our facilities 
for a larger participation in the trade of the East, by means of 
our recent settlements on the shores of the Pacific, are too 
obvious to be overlooked or disregarded. 

"The questions in relation to rank in the army and navy, 
and relative rank between officers of the two branches of the 
service, presented to the Executive by certain resolutions of 
the House of Representatives, at the last session of Congress, 
have been submitted to a board of officers in each branch of 
the service, and their report may be expected at an early day. 

"I also earnestly recommend the enactment of a law autho 
rizing officers of the army and navy to be retired from the 
service, when incompetent for its vigorous and active duties, 
taking care to make suitable provision for those who have faith- 
fully served their country, and awarding distinctions, by retain- 
ing in appropriate commands those who have been particularly 



FIKST AJ^NUAL MESSAGE. 171 

conspicuous for gallantry and good conduct. While the otli- 
gatiun of the country to maintain and honor those who, to the 
exclusion of other pursuits, have devoted themselves to its 
arduous service, this obligation should not be permitted to 
interfere with the efficiency of the service itself. 

"I am gratitied in being able to state, that the estimates of 
expenditure for the navy in the ensuing year are less, by, more 
than one million of dollars, than those of the present, except- 
ing the appropriation which may become necessary for tlie 
construction of a dock on the coast of the Pacific, propositions 
for which are now being considered, and on which a special 
report may be expected early in your present session. 

"There is an evident justness in the suggestion of the same 
report, that appropriations for the naval service proper should 
be separated from those for fixed and permanent objects, such 
as building docks and navy-yards, and the fixtures attached, 
and from the extraordinary objects under the care of the de- 
partment, which, however important, are not essentially naval. 

"A revision of the code for the government of the navy 
seems to require the immediate consideration of Congress. Its 
system of crimes and punishments had undergone no change 
for half a century, until the last session, though its defects 
have been often and ably pointed out, and the abolition of a 
particular species of corporal punishment, which then took 
place, without providing any substitute, has left the service in 
a state of defecdveuess which calls for prompt correction, i 
therefore recommend that the whole subject be revised with- 
out delay, and such a system established for the enforcement 
of discipline, as shall be at once humane and etfectual. 

"The accompanying report of the postmaster-general pre- 
sents a satisfactory view of the operations and condition of that 
department. 

"At the close of the last fiscal year, the length of the inland 
mail routes in the United States (not embracing the service in 
Oregon and Califurnia) was one hundred and seventy-eight 
thousand six hundred and seventy-two miles; the annual trans- 
portadon thereon forty-six million five hundred and forty-one 
thousand four hundred and twenty-three miles ; and the 
annual cost of such transportation two millions severf hun- 
dred and twenty-four thousand four hundred and twenty -si.x 
dollars. 



172 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMOKL'. 

''The increase of the annual transportation over that of the 
preceding year, was three millions nine hundred and ninety- 
seven thousand three hundred and tifty-four miles, and the 
increase in cost was three hundred and forty-two thousand 
four hundred and forty dollars. 

"The number of post-offices in the United States, on the 
first day of July last, was eighteen thousand four hundred and 
seventeen — being an increase of sixteen hundred and seventy 
during the preceding year. 

"The gross revenues of the department for the fiscal year 
ending June 30th, 1850, amounted to five millions five hun- 
dred and fifty-two thousand nine hundred and seventy-one 
dollars and forty-eight cents, including the annual appropria- 
tion of two hundred thousand dollars for the franked matter 
of the departments, and excluding the foreign postages collected 
for and payable to the British government. 

*'The expenditures for the same period were five millions 
two hundred and twelve thousand nine hundred and fifty-three 
dollars and forty-three cents — leaving a balance of revenue 
over expenditures of three hundred and forty thousand and 
eighteen dollars and five cents. 

" I am happy to find that the fiscal condition of the depart- 
ment is such as to justify the postmaster-general in recommend- 
ing the reduction of our inland letter postage to three cents 
the single letter when prepaid, and five cents when not prepaid. 
He also recommends that the prepaid rate shall be reduced to 
two cents whenever the revenues of the department, after the 
reduction, shall exceed its expenditures by more than live per 
cent, for two consecutive years; that the postage upon Califor- 
nia and other letters sent by our ocean steamers shall be much 
reduced ; and that the rates of postage on newspapers, pamph- 
lets, periodicals, and other printed matter, shall be modified, 
and some reduction thereon made. 

*'It can not be doubted that the proposed reductions will, for 
the present, diminish the revenues of the department. It is 
believed that the deficiency, after the surplus already accumu- 
lated shall be exhausted, may be almost wholly met, either by 
abolishing the existing privileges of sending free matter through 
the mails, or by paying out of the treasury to the post-office 
department a sum equivalent to the postage of which it is de- 
prived by such privileges. Tho last is supposed to be the 



FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 173 

preferable mode, and will, if not entirely, so nearly supply that 
deficiency as to make any further appropriation that may be 
found necessary so inconsiderable as to form no obstacle to the 
proposed reductions. 

"I entertain no doubt of the authority of Congress to make 
appropriations for leading objects in that class of public works 
comprising what are usually called works of internal improve- 
ment. This authority I suppose to be derived chiefly from the 
power of regulating commerce with foreign nations, and among 
the States, and the power of levying and collecting imposts. 
Where commerce is to be carried on, and imposts collected, 
there must be ports and harbors, as well as wharves and cus- 
tom-houses. If ships, laden with valuable cargoes, approach 
the shore, or sail along the coast, light-houses are necessary at 
suitable points for the protection of life and property. Other 
facilities and securities for commerce and navigation are hardly 
less important; and those clauses of the constitution, therefore, 
to which I have referred, have received from the origin of the 
government a liberal and beneficial construction. Not only 
have light houses, buoys, and beacons been established, and 
floating lights maintained, but harbors have been cleared and 
improved, piers constructed, and even breakwaters for the 
safety of shipping, and sea walls to protect harbors from being 
tilled* up, and rendered useless, by the action of the ocean, have 
been erected at very great expense. And this construction 
of the constitution appears the more reasonable from the con- 
sideration, that if these works, of such evident importance and 
utility, are not to be accomplished by Congress, they can not 
be accomplished at all. By the adoption of the constitution 
the several States voluntarily parted with the power of collect- 
ing duties of impost in their own ports, and it is not to be ex- 
pected thai they should raise money, by internal taxation, 
direct or indirect, for the benefit of that commerce, the reve- 
nues derived from which do not, either in whole or in part, go 
into their own treasuries. Nor do I perceive any difference 
between the power of Congress to make appropriations for 
objects of this kind on the ocean and the power to make ap- 
propriations for similar objects on lakes and rivers, wherever 
they are large enough Ut> bear on their waters an extensive 
traffic. The magnificent Mississippi and its tributaries, and 
the vast lakes of the north and the northwest, appear to me to 



1X4 BIOGKAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

fall within the exercise of the power, as justly and as clearly 
as the ocean and the Gulf of Mexico. It is a mistake to re- 
gard expenditures judiciously made for these objects as expen- 
ditures for local purposes. The position, or site of the work, is 
necessarily local ; but its utihty is general. A ship canal around 
the falls of St. Mary of less than a mile in length, though local 
in its construction, would yet be national in its purpose and its 
benefits, as it would remove the only obstruction to a naviga- 
tion of more than a thousand miles, affecting several States, as 
well as our commercial relations with Canada. So, too, the 
breakwater at the mouth of the Delaware is erected, not for 
the exclusive benefit of the States bordering on the bay and 
river of that name, but for that of the whole coastwise naviga- 
tion of the United States, and, to a considerable extent also, of 
foreign commerce. If a ship be lost on the bar at the entrance 
of a southern port for want of sufficient depth of water, it is 
very likely to be a northern ship ; and if a steamboat be sunk 
in any part of the Mississippi, on account of its channel not 
having been properly cleared of obstructions, it may be a boat 
belonging to either of eight or ten States. I may add, as some- 
what remarkable, that among all the thirty-one States, there is 
none that is not, to a greater or less extent, bounded on the 
ocean, or the Gulf of Mexico, or one of the great lakes, or some 
navigable river. 

'' in fultilling our constitutional duties, fellow-citizens, on this 
subject, as in carrying into effect all other powers conferred by 
Uie constitution, we should consider ourselves as dehberating 
ana acting for one and the same country, and bear constantly 
in miml, that our regard and our duty are due, not to a par- 
L.cuiar part only, but lO the whole. 

"i Liierelore recommend that appropriations be made for 
coaipleLing such works as have been already begun, and for 
cuauutiuciag such others as may seem to the wisdom of Con- 
giX'Ss to be of public and general importance. 

"The ditiiculLies and delays, incident to the settlement of 
private claims by Congress, amount in many cases to a denial 
ut justice. There is reason to apprehend that many unfortu- 
nate creUitors of the government have thereby been unavoid- 
•ccbly i-uined. Congress has so miich business of a public 
cuaiacter, that it is impossible it shuuld give much attention 
to mere private claims, and their accumulation is now so great 



FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 175 

that many claimants must despair of ever being- able to obtain 
a hearing. It may well be doubted whetlier Conoress, from 
the nature of its organization, is properly constituted to decide 
upon such cases. It is impossible thcit each member should 
examine the merits of every claim on which he is compelled to 
vote; and it is preposterous to ask a' judge to decide a case 
which he has never heard. Such decisions may, and frequent- 
ly must, do injustice either to the claimant or the government; 
and I perceive no better remedy for this growing evil than the 
establishment of some tribunal to adjudicate upon such claims. 
I beg leave, therefore, most respectfully to recommend that 
provision be made by law for the appointment of a commission 
to settle all private claims against the United States ; and, as 
an ex parte hearing must in all contested cases be very unsat- 
isfactory, I also recommend the appointment of a solicitor, 
whose duty it shall be to represent the government before 
such commission, and protect it against all illegal, fraudulent 
or unjust claims, which may be presented for their adjudication. 

" This district, which has neither voice nor vote in your de- 
liberations, looks to you for protection and aid, and I commend 
all its wants to your favorable consideration, with a full confi- 
dence that you will meet them not only with justice, but with 
liberahty. It should be borne in mind that in this city, laid 
out by Washington, and consecrated by his name, is located 
the capitol of our nation, the emblem of our Union and the 
symbol of our greatness. Here also are situated all the public 
buildings necessary for the use of the government, and all 
these are exempt from taxation. It should be the pride of 
Americans to render this place attractive to the people of the 
whole Repubhc, and convenient and safe for the transaction 
of the public business and the preservation of the public 
records. The government should, therefore, bear a liberal 
proportion of the burdens of all necessary and useful improve- 
ments ; and as nothing could contribute more to the health, 
comfort, and safety of the city, and the security of the public 
buildings and records, than an abundant supply of pure water, 
I respectfully recommend that you make such provisions for 
obtaining the same as in your wisdom you may deem proper. 

"The act passed at your last session, making certain propo- 
sitions to Texas for settling the disputed boundary between that 
State and the territory of New Mexico, was, immediately on its 



17(5 "BIOQRAPHT uF JIILLARD FILLMOKE. 

passage, transmitted by express to the Governor of Texas, to 
be laid by him before the General Assembly for its agreement 
thereto. Its receipt was duly acknowledged, but no official 
information has yet been received of the action of the General 
Assembly thereon; it may, however, be very soon expected, 
as, by the terms of the propositions submitted, they were to 
have been acted upon, on or before the first day of the present 
month. 

" It was hardly to have been expected that the series of 
measures passed at your last session, with the view of healing 
the sectional differences which had sprung from the slavery 
and territorial questions, should at once have realized their 
beneficent purposes. All mutual concession in the nature of a 
compromise must necessarily be unwelcome to men of extreme 
opinions. And though without such concessions our constitu- 
tion could not have been formed, and can not be permanently 
sustained, yet ive have seen them made the subject of bitter 
controversy in both sections of the Republic. It required 
many months of discussion and deliberation to secure the con 
currence of a majority of Congress in their favor. It would be 
strange if they had been received with immediate approbation 
by people and States, prejudiced and heated by the exciting 
controversies of their representatives. I believe those meas- 
ures to have been required by the circumstances and condition 
of the country. I believe they were necessary to allay asper- 
ities and animosities that were rapidly alienating one section 
of the country from another, and destroying those fraternal 
sentiments which are the strongest supports of the constitu- 
tion. They were adopted in the spirit of conciliation, and for 
the purpose of conciliation. I believe that a great majority of 
our fellow-citizens sympathize in that spirit, and that purpose, 
and in the main approve, and are prepared, in all respects, to 
sustain these enactments. I can not doubt that the American 
people, bound together by kindred blood and common tradi- 
tions, still cherish a paramount regard for the Union of their 
fathers, and that they are ready to rebuke any attempt to vio- 
late its integrity, to disturb the compromises on which it is 
based, or to resist the laws which have been enacted under its 
authority. 

''The series of measures to which I have alluded are re- 
garded by me as a settlement, in principle and substance — a 



FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE. 177 

fiaal settlement of the dangerous and exciting subjects which 
they embraced. Most of these subjects, indeed, are beyond 
your reach, as the legislation which disposed of them was, in 
its character, final and irrevocable. It may be presumed from 
tlie opposition which they all encountered that none of those 
measures were free from imperfections, but in their mutual de- 
pendence and connection they formed a system of compromise, 
the most conciliatory, and best for the entire country, that could 
be obtained from conflicting sectional interests and opinions. 

"For this reason 1 recommend youi* adherence to the ad- 
justment established by those measures, until time and expe- 
rience shall demonstrate the necessity of further legislation to 
guard against evasion or abuse. 

"By that adjustment we have been rescued from the wide 
and boundless agitation that surrounded us, and have a firm, 
distinct, and legal ground to rest upon. And the occasion, I 
trust, will justify me in exhorting my countrymen to rally upon 
and maintain that ground as the best, if not the only means 
of restoring peace and quiet to the country, and maintaining 
inviolate the integrity of the Union. 

"And now, fellow-citizens, I can not bring this communica- 
tion to a close without invoking you to join me in humble and 
devout thanks to the Great Ruler of nations, for the multiplied 
blessmgs which he has graciously bestowed upon us. His 
hand, so often visible in our preservation, has stayed the pesti- 
lence, saved us from foreign wars and domestic disturbances, 
and scattered plenty throughout the land. 

"Our liberties, religious and civil, have been maintained; 
the fountains of knowledge have all been kept open, and means 
of happiness widely spread and generally enjoyed, greater than 
have fallen to the lot of any other nation. And, while deeply 
penetrated with gratitude for the past, let us hope that his 
all- wise Providence will so guide our counsels, as that they 
shall result in giving satisfaction to our constituents, securing 
the peace of the country, and adding new strength to the 
united government under which we Hve. 

"Millard Fillmore. 
"Washington, December 2d, 1850." 

As there was a large political majority against the President 
in both Houses of Congress, none of his excellent recomraend- 



178 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

ations requiring legislation were adopted, except those for an 
asylum for disabled and destitute seamen, and for the settle- 
ment of land claims in California, and the survey of the public 
lands. A bill making appropriations for the improvement of 
rivers and harbors passed the House, but was defeated in the 
Senate, by Senators "talking against time" on the last day 
of the session, and preventing a vote until the constitutional 
terra of Congress had expired. 



CUBA AND THE FILLIBUSTERS. 17t) 



CHAPTER XL 

CUBA AND THE FILLIBUSTERS. 

The able and patriotic message which we have copied in the 
preceding chapter, furnishes abundant proof of the wisdom of 
Mr. Fjllmore's views on questions of domestic policy. He 
labored during the whole period of his administration under 
the disadvantage of an adverse political majority in Congress; 
but the fact that all his recommendations were not immediate- 
ly adopted, did not impair his confidence in their propriety, and 
he repeated such as remained unacted on, in subsequent annual 
messages. 

Important as it is that the chief magistrate of the nation 
should entertain sound and enlightened opinions on domestic 
questions, it can hardly be disputed that his foreign policy is 
fraught with still weightier consequences. In a country like 
ours, whose commerce is second to that of none on the globe, 
whose sails whiten every sea, and whose flag is seen in every 
port, the most important of all our interests is the preservation 
of peace and friendly relations with the other powers of the 
world. Our foreign relations are more especially committed 
to the management of the national executive, than any other 
branch of the diversified interests which require the protection 
of the government. The influence of the President on the 
domestic policy of the country is comparatively limited. So 
far as he is an executive officer, he has no choice but to enforce 
the laws as they actually exist, whatever may be his opinion 
of their wisdom. In the enaction of laws, he has merely the 



180 BIOGHAPHT OF MILLARD FILLMOKE. 

power of making recommendations which Congress adopts or 
rejects at its pleasure. The veto power gives him a check on 
hasty or unconstitutional legislation ; but the occasions are rare 
on which the President would judge it necessary to thwart tlie 
will of Congress, and even then, things are merely left as they 
were. But while he is thus powerless to impress any change 
on the domestic policy of the country, all changes in its fereign 
policy are entirely in his hands. The Senate may revise his 
action and refuse to ratify treaties negotiated by his authority, 
but they have no power to initiate anything, nor any other 
choice than cither to sanction the foreign policy of the execu- 
tive or leave matters in their former condition. The President 
neo-otiates treaties which, when ratified, become the supreme 
law of the land ; he receives and dismisses foreign ambassa- 
dors; he recognizes or refuses to recognize governments that 
have been newly estabHshed; he orders our naval forces to 
whatever part of the world, and charges them with whatever 
duties he pleases; and by the exercise of these powers he can 
promote or imperil the prosperity of the country to an extent 
which is impossible by his participation in measures of domes- 
tic legislation. When the people are deliberating on the choice 
of a chief magistrate, they should never overlook the important 
fact, that while the domestic policy of the country is more 
especially under the control of Congress, its foreign policy is 
in the hands of the President, and demands that he should be 
a wise, firm, experienced, and patriotic statesman. The party 
which have nominated Mr. Fillmore appeal- with confidence to 
the history of his administration for sure guaranties that the 
honor and interests of the country would be safe m his hands, 
so far as they can be affected by the management of our for* 
eign relations. 

Soon after the close of the session of Congress to which Mr. 

Fillmore's first message was addressed, the public prints were 

, filled with rumors of a new expedition against Cuba, which 



CUBA AND THE FILLIBUSTERa. 181 

was to sail from some of our southern ports. Armed expedi- 
tions against a foreign country with which we are at peace, are 
in direct violation of our laws, and the President thought it his 
duty to issue the following proclamation : 

" Whereas, there is reason to believe that a military expedi- 
tion is about to be fitted out in the United States with in- 
tention to invade the island of Cuba, a colony of Spain, with 
which this country is at peace; and whereas it is believed that 
this expedition is instigated and set on foot chietiy by foreign- 
ers, who dare to make our shores the scene of their guilty and 
hostile preparations against a friendly power, and seek, by 
falsehood and misrepresentation, to seduce our own citizens, 
especially the young and inconsiderate, into their wicked 
schemes — an ungrateful return for the benefits conferred 
upon them by this people in permitting them to make our 
country an asylum from oppression, and in tlagrant abuse of 
the hospitality thus extended to them. 

"And whereas, such expeditions can only be regarded as 
adventures for plunder and robbery, and must meet the con- 
demnation of the civilized world, whilst they are derogatory to 
the character of our country, in violation of the laws of nations, 
and expressly prohibited by our own. Our statutes declare, 
'that, it any person shall, within the territory or jurisdiction 
of the United States, b<4gin or set on foot, or provide or pre- 
pare the means for any military expedition or enterprise, to be 
carried on from thence against the territory or dominions of 
any foreign Prince or State, or of any colony, district, or people, 
with whom the United t^tates are at peace, every person so 
offending shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and 
shall be fined not exceeding three thousand dollars, and im- 
prisoned not more than three years.' 

"Now, therefore, 1 have issued this, my proclamation, warn- 
ing all persons who shall connect themselves with any such 
enterprise or expedition, in violation of our laws and national 
obligations, that they will thereby subject themselves to the 
heavy penalties denounced against such oflfenders, and will for- 
feit their claim to the protection of this government, or any 
interference on their behalf, no matter to what extremities they 
may be reduced in consequence of their illegal conduct. And, 



182 BIOGKAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

therefore, I exhort all good citizen's, as they regard our national 
reputation, as they respect their own laws and the laws of na- 
tions, as they value the blessings of peace and the welfare of 
their country, to discountenance, and by all lawful means pre- 
vent, any such enterprise ; and I call upon every officer of this 
government, civil or military, to use all efibrts in his power to 
arrest for trial and punishment every such oflfender against the 
laws of the country. 

"Given under my hand the twenty-fifth day cf April, in the 
year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and fifty-one, and 
the seventy-fifth of the independence of the United States. 

"Millard Fillmore. 
"By the President: 

^*W. S. Derrick, Acting Secretary of State." 



If this proclamation warning them of the consequences of 
their rash and unlawful enterprise, rendered the fillibusters 
more guarded and cautious, it did not lead them to relinquish 
their designs. As several months elapsed before their prepar- 
ations were matured, we will relate some intervening occur- 
rences, before completing the history of Mr. Fillmore's pohcy 
in relation to Cuba. 

The New York and Erie Railroad, the most costly work of 
the kind in the United States, had just been finished, and the 
President and his cabinet had been invited to assist in cele- 
brating its completion. The interest which Mr. Fillmore had 
always felt in works of internal improvement led him to accept 
•the invitation, and on the morning of the 12th of May, 1851, 
he left Washington accompanied by Mr. Webster, Mr. Critten- 
den, Mr. Graham, and Mr. Hall. Several months had elapsed 
since the passage of the compromise measures, and notwith- 
standing the clamorous opposition of anti-slavery fanatics tc the 
execution of the fugitive slave law, the public mind was settling 
into acquiescence. But it was not anticipated that the people 
of the northern States were so soon ready to testify, by the 
most impressive demonstrations, their warm approbation of that 



TOUR TO THE NOKTU. 183 

settlement regarded as a whole, and their lively admiration of 
the patriotism which had been willing to incur reproach in the 
cause of the Union. All the way from Washington to Lake 
Erie the presidential tour was a triumphal progress. Nothing 
was ever more spontaneous, cordial and enthusiastic than the 
greetings with which the President and his party were wel- 
comed. At Baltimore, at Philadelphia, at New York, at Buf- 
falo, at Rochester, at all the intermediate towns, at every 
railroad station, multitudes thronged to see the President and 
pay him their respects. Processions were formed, flags with 
complimentary devices and mottoes were displayed, banquets 
were spread, speeches were made, and all the cities through 
which he passed vied with each other in the warmth, the 
heartiness, and the extent of their demonstrations. Never 
since the presidential tour of Mr. Monroe, in 1817, had a Pres?- 
ident been received through the country with such hospitable 
and enthusiastic cordiality. Party spirit seemed to have been 
forgotten, and every man was anxious to testify his admiration 
of the eminent services of an honest an4 faithful public servant. 
From this succession of splendid ovations, Mr. Fillmore returned 
to Washington, on the 24th of May, after an absence of twelve 
days. It must have been gratifying to him, after the obloquy 
he had braved in the discharge of his duty, to find that the 
praise of patriotic intentions and statesmanlike conduct was 
freely awarded him in that section of the country where it was 
supposed his course would have proved least acceptable. 
Everywhere during his tour, the voice of factious opposition 
had been hushed, and there had been no discord to mar the 
general harmony. 

A few weeks after his return to Washington, the cares of 
oflSce were relieved by an interesting event, in which he par- 
ticipated. Congress, during the preceding session, had made 
an appropriation for the extension of the Capitol according to 
such plan as might be offered by the President, By the plan 



184 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

which he adopted two wings were to be added to the previous 
edifice, connected with it by corridors. Excavations for the 
foundation were immediately commenced, and agreeably to the 
wishes of the President, the work was in sufficient forwardness 
to allow the corner stone to be laid on the fourth of July. 
This was done by the President's own hand, with imposing 
ceremonies, and amid a great concourse of people, who were 
eloquently addressed by Mr. Webster, the Secretary of State. 
The President was assisted in laying the corner stone by the 
Grand Master of the Masonic Grand Lodge, who wore the 
same regalia and used the identical gavel which Washington 
had used fifty-eight years before in laying the corner stone 
of the original edifice. 

During an interval of apparent quiet since the publication 
of the President's proclamation, the fillibusters had not been 
idle. The memorable and disastrous expedition of Lopez was 
fitted out, and sailed from the port of New Orleans by the 
connivance of the collector. The history of that unfortunate 
aflfair was so clearly and succinctly given in the President's 
next annual message to Congress, that we transcribe that por- 
tion of the message which relates to it: 

"Very early in the morning of the third of August, a 
steamer called the Pampero departed from New Orleans for 
Cuba, having on board upwards of four hundred armed men, 
with evident intentions to make war upon the authorities of 
the island. This expedition was set on foot in palpable viola- 
tion of the laws of the United States. Its leader was a Span- 
iard, and several of the chief officers, and some others engaged 
in it, were foreigners. The persons composing it, however, were 
mostly citizens of the United States. 

"Before the expedition set out, and probably before it was 
organized, a slight insurrectionary movement, which appears to 
have been soon suppressed, had taken place in the eastern 
quarter of Cuba. The importance of this movement was un- 
fortunately so much exaggerated in the accounts of it published 
in this country, that these adventurers seem to have been led 



THE LOPEZ EXPEDITIOlf. 185 

to believe that the Creole population of the island not only de- 
sired to throw off the authority of the mother country, but had 
resolved upo;i that step, and had begun a well-concerted enter- 
prise for effecting it. The persons engaged in the expedition 
were generally young and ill-informed. The steamer in which 
they embarked left New Orleans stealthily and without a 
clearance. After touching at Key West, she proceeded to the 
coast of Cuba, and, on the night between the 11th and 12th 
of Auo-ust, landed the persons on board at Playtas, within 
about twenty leagues of Havana. 

" The main body of them proceeded to, and took possession 
of, an inland village, six leagues distant, leaving others to fol- 
low in charge of the baggage, as soon as the means of trans- 
portation could ha obtained. The latter, having taken up their 
line of march to connect themselves with the main body, and 
having proceeded about four leagues into the country, were 
attacked on the morning of the 13th by a body of Spanish 
troops, and a bloody conflict ensued; after which they re- 
treated to the place of disembarkation, where about fifty of 
them obtained boats and reembarked therein. They were, 
however, intercepted among the keys near the shore by a 
Spanish steamer cruising on the coast, captured, and carried to 
Havana, and, after being examined before a military court, 
were sentenced to be publicly executed, and the sentence was 
carried into effect on the 16th of August. 

"On receiving information of what had occurred. Commodore 
Foxhall A. Parker w^as instructed to proceed in the steam- 
frigate Saranac to Havana, and inquire into the charges against 
the persons executed, the circumstances under which they 
were taken, and whatsoever referred to their trial and sentence. 
Copies of the instructions from the Department of State to 
him, and of his letters to that department, are herewith sub- 
mitted. 

"According to the record of the examination, the prisoners all 
admitted the offenses charged against them, of being hostile 
invaders of the island. At the lime of their trial and execu- 
tion, the main body of the invaders was still in the field, mak- 
ing war upon the Spanish authorities and Spanish subjects. 
After the lapse of some days, being overcome by the Spanish 
troops, they dispersed on the 24th of August. Lopez, their 
leader, was captured some days after, and executed on the 1st 



186 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

of September. Many of his remaining followers were killed, 
or died of hunger and fatigue, and the' rest were made pris- 
oners. Of these none appear to have been tried or executed. 
Several of them were pardoned upon application of their 
friends and others, and the rest, about one hundred and sixty 
in number, were sent to Spain. Of the final disposition made 
of these we have no official information. 

" Such is the melancholy result of this illegal and ill-fated 
expedition. Thus, thoughtless young men have been induced, 
by false and fraudulent representations, to violate the Jaw of 
their country, through rash and unfounded expectations of 
assisting to accomplish political revolutions in other States, and 
have lost their lives in the undertaking. Too severe a judg- 
ment can hardly be passed, by the indignant sense of the com- 
munity, upon those who, being better informed themselves, 
have yet led away the ardor of youth, and an ill-directed 
love of political liberty. The correspondence between this 
government and that of Spain relating to this transaction is 
herewith communicated. 

" Although these ofifenders against the laws have forfeited the 
protection of their country, yet the government may, so far as 
is consistent with its obligations to other countries, and its fixed 
purpose to maintain and enforce the laws, entertain sym- 
pathy for their unoffending families and friends, as well as a 
feeling of compassion for themselves. Accordingly no proper 
eflfort has been spared, and none will be spared, to procure 
the release of such citizens of the United States, engaged in 
this unlawful enterprise, as are now in confinement in Spain ; 
but it is to be hoped that such interposition with the govern- 
ment of that country may not be considered as affording any 
ground of expectation that the government of the United 
States will, hereafter, feel itself under any obligation of duty 
to intercede for the liberation or pardon of such persons as 
are flagrant ofifenders against the law of nations and the laws 
of the United States. These laws must be executed. If we 
desire to maintain our respectability among the nations of the 
earth, it behooves us to enforce steadily the neutrality acts 
passed by Congress, and to follow, as far as may be, the vio- 
lation of those ac<^s with condign punishment. 

" But what gives a peculiar criminaJity to this invasion of 
Cuba is, that under the lead of Spanish subjects, and with the 



THE LOPEZ EXPEDITION. 187 

aid of citizens of the United States, it had its origin, with 
many, in motives of cupidity. Money was advanced by indi- 
viduals, probably in considerable amounts, to purchase Cuban 
bonds, as they have been called, issued by Lopez, sold, doubt- 
less, at a very large discount, and for the payment of which 
the public lands and public property of Cuba, of whatever 
kind, and the fiscal resources of the people and government 
of that island, from whatever source to be derived, were 
pledged, as well as the good faith of the government expected 
to be established. All these means of payment, it is evident, 
were only to be obtained by a process of bloodshed, war, and 
revolution. None will deny that those who set on foot military 
expeditions against foreign states by means like these, are far 
more culpable than the ignorant and the necessitous whom 
they induce to go forth as the ostensible parties in the proceed- 
ing. These originators of the invasion of Cuba seem to have 
determined, with coolness and system, upon an undertaking 
which should disgrace their country, violate its laws, and put 
to hazard the lives of ill-informed and deluded men. You will 
consider whether further legislation be necessary to prevent 
the perpetration of such offenses in future. 

" No individuals have a right to hazard the peace of the 
country, or to violate its laws, upon vague notions of altering 
or reforming governments in other states. This principle is 
not only reasonable in itself, and in accordance with public 
law, but is engrafted into the codes of other nations as well 
as our own. But while such are the sentiments of this govern- 
ment, it may be added that every independent nation must 
be presumed to be able to defend its possessions against unau- 
thorized individuals banded together to attack them. The 
government of the United States, at all times since its estab- 
hshment, has abstained, and has sought to restrain the citizens 
of the country from entering into controversies between other 
powers, and to observe all the duties of neutrality. At an 
early period of the government, in the administration of Wash- 
ington, several laws were passed for this purpose. The main 
provisions of these laws were reenacted by the act of April, 
1818, by which, amongst other things, it was declared that, 
if any person shall, within the territory or jurisdiction of the 
United States, begin, or set on foot, or provide or prepare the 
means for any military expedition or enterprise, to be carried 



188 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAKD FILLMORE. 

on from thence against the territory or dominion of any foreign 
pnnce or state, or of any colony, district or people, with whom 
the United States are at peace, every person so offending 
shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and shall be 
lined, not exceeding three thousand dollars, and imprisoned 
not more than three years; and this law has been executed 
and enforced, to the full extent of the power of the govern- 
ment, from that day to this. 

"In proclaiming and adhering to the doctrine of neutrality 
and non-intervention, the United States have not followed the 
had of other civilized nations ; they have taken the lead them- 
selves, and have been followed by others. This was admitted 
by one of the most eminent of modern British statesmen, 
who said in Parliament, while a minister of the crown, that, 
*if he wished for a system of neutrality, he should take that 
laid down by America in tlie days of Washington and the 
secretaryship of Jefferson ; ' and we see, in fact, that the act 
of Congress of 1818 was followed, the succeeding year, by 
an act of the Parliament of England, substantially the same 
in its general provisions. Up to that time there had been no 
similar law in England, except certain highly penal statutes 
passed in the reign of George 11, prohibiting English subjects 
from enhsting in foreign service, the avowed object of which 
statutes was, that foreign armies, raised for the purpose of 
restoring the house of Stuart to the throne, should not be 
strengthened by recruits from England herself. 

"All must see that difficulties may arise in carrying the 
laws referred to into execution in a country now having three 
or four thousand miles of sea-coast, with an infinite number 
of ports and harbors, and small inlets, from some of which 
unlawful expeditions may suddenly set forth, without the 
knowledge of government, against the possessions of foreign 
states. 

" Friendly relations with all, but entangling alliances with 
none, has long been a maxim with us. Our true mission is 
not to propagate our opinions, or impose upon other countries 
our form of government, b}^ artifice or force: but to teach by 
example, and show by our success, moderation and justice, 
the blessings of self-government, and the advantages of free 
institutions. Let every people choose for itself, and make and 
alter its political institutions to suit its own condition and con- 



THE LOPEZ EXPEDITION. 189 

venience. But, while we avow and maintain this neutral poHcy 
ourselves, we are anxious to see the same forbearance on the 
part of other nations, whose forms of government are different 
from our own. The deep interest which we feel in the spread 
of liberal principles and the establishment of free governments, 
and the sympathy with which we witness every struggle 
against oppression, forbid that we should be indifferent to a 
case in which the strong arm of a foreign power is invoked to 
stifle public sentiment and repress the spirit of freedom in any 
country." 

That portion of the misguided followers of Lopez who were 
sent to Spain were finally pardoned, and Congress provided 
for their expenses home. The collector of New Orleans was 
removed from office for neglect of duty, and the Pampero was 
seized by order of government, near Jackson, Florida, and 
tried, condemned, and sold, for a violation of our neutrality laws. 

President Fillmore's course in relation to Cuba was very 
generally approved by the country. The fundamental prin- 
ciple of his pohcy was, that the people of one nation are no 
proper judges of the political necessities of another, particularly 
when they differ in language, religion, habits of thought, tra- 
ditions, prejudices, and training. By a powerful and instinctive 
impulse, every people indignantly repel foreign interference in 
their government; and this spontaneous dictate of patriotism 
is reinforced by the conclusions of the calmest and most 
enlightened reason. None except those who live among a 
people, and share their feelings and prejudices, are proper 
judges of the kind of government that is suited to their 
wants. It is therefore as absurd in itself as it is contrary to 
the law of nations, for one people to attempt to revolutionize 
the government of another. This principle, which lay at the 
foundation of Mr. Fillmore's foreign policy, is also the cardinal 
principle of the American party. It matters little whether a 
foreign people, who have no appreciation of our political wants, 
attempt to subvert our institutions by the force of arras or the 



190 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

agency of the ballot box. In either case they are meddling 
with matters they do not understand, and exercise a kind of 
interference which a patriotic spirit can not brook. 

Although it will involve a departure from strict chrono- 
logical order, we will complete the history of Mr. Fillmore's 
policy respecting Cuba before concluding this chapter. 

The unfortunate termination of the Lopez expedition did not 
quell the fiUibustering spirit in the United States, nor quiet the 
suspicions of the authorities of Cuba. In the autumn of 1852, 
the steamer Crescent City, which plied regularly between 
New York and New Orleans, touching at Havana, and carry- 
ing the United States mail, had a purser by the name of 
Smith, who was suspected of being an agent of mischief be- 
tween the revolutionists in the. island and their abettors in New 
York. He was charged by the Cuban authoi'ities with bear- 
ing messages back and forth, and communicating inflammatory 
articles to the New York newspapers for the purpose of fo- 
menting the discontent which threatened the loss of the island 
by Spain. This individual having thus become obnoxious, the 
Captain-general of Cuba objected to his landing. This he had 
an undoubted right to do; for no principle is better established 
than that the government of every nation has a right to exclude 
from its territories all persons whom it may consider dangerous 
to its peace. The owner of the Crescent City, however, de- 
clined to remove purser Smith from his steamer — insisted 
that it should land at Havana with him on board, and threat- 
ened to seek redress by force if the vessel should not be per- 
mitted to land. This would amount to a declaration of war by 
a private individual. Although the President did not approve 
the conduct of the Captain-general of Cuba, and made it the 
subject of diplomatic representations to the Court of Spain, he 
did not recognize the right of a private citizen to take the 
redress of his supposed grievances into his own hands, and he 
addressed a letter to the collector of New York, stating that 



CAPTAIN-GENERAL OF CUBA. 191 

if the owner of the Crescent City should repeat his attempts 
to enter the port of Havana, and by violating- the laws of a 
foreign nation within its own jurisdiction, should forfeit his 
vessel, he could expect no indemnity for such an act of folly 
from the United States government. As we regulate the con- 
ditions on which all foreign vessels may enter our ports, and 
fix the penalties for the violation of our laws, and never allow 
the right to do so to be questioned by foreigners, so we are 
not permitted to question their right to make and enforce their 
own regulations. The President, therefore, decided that the 
owner of the Crescent City must wait the result of the nego- 
tiations between the two governments. It was not a question 
to be settled between him and Cuba, nor even between the 
United States and Cuba, but between the United States and 
Spain, which is responsible for the conduct of the 'governor of 
Cuba. The course of the President on this occasion was 
warmly approved by the public press. 

The forays against Cuba by armed fillibusters from this 
country, attracted the attention of European governments, and 
the supposed danger that the island would be wrested from 
Spain and fall into the possession of the United States, alarmed 
that jealousy of our growth which is habitual with those gov- 
ernments. In the early part of the year 1852, a proposal was 
made to the Secretary of State, by the French and English 
ministers, to enter into a tripartite treaty by which the three 
powers should bind themselves for all coming time neither to 
make any attempt to acquire Cuba for themselves, nor to 
countenance any such attempts by others. Although this pro- 
posal evinced a disposition on the part of foreign governments 
to impertinent interference in our affairs, the communication 
of the French minister was treated respectfully. Mr. Webster 
addressed him a note stating that the President would take 
the proposal of the French and English governments into con- 
sideration and make the questions it involved the subject of 



192 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAKD IILLMUKE, 

mature reflection. Although the President had, with the most 
unflinching determination, exerted his official authority for re- 
pressing the attempts of the fillibusters, which were made the 
occasion of this proposal, and was opposed, for reasons of do- 
mestic policy, to the immediate acquisition of Cuba, even if it 
could be gained by purchase and without an interruption of 
friendly relations with Spain, he was nevertheless decidedly 
opposed to entering into any such arrangement as that pro- 
posed by France and England. He adhered to the wise policy 
of Washington and Jefl'erson, which was opposed to entangling 
alliances with foreign powers. He was not willing to place the 
government of this country in such a condition that it would 
be responsible to others for the proper discharge of ils duly. 
So far as related to the acquisition of Cuba by other powers, 
he knew that this country had both the will and the abilitv to 
prevent it, without foreign assistance. As to its acquisitioii by 
ourselves, although we did not want it at present, he regarded 
it as a geographical and political necessity that it would, at 
some future time, fall into our hands ; and he would not allow 
a treaty with foreign nations to fetter the march of our destiny. 

The final reply of our government to this proposal for a tri- 
partite treaty was not made until after the death of Mr. Web- 
ster. In the fall of 1852, Mr. Everett had accepted the office 
of Secretary of State, and on the first of December, in that 
year, he addressed to the Count de Sartiges, by the direction 
of the President, a letter which ranks among the ablest state 
papers ever issued by the American government. 

Mr. Everett stated that the most serious attention bad been 
given to this proposal by the President, who at the same time 
that he did not covet the acquisition of Cuba for the United 
States, considered the condition of the island as an American 
and not a European question, and objected to the proposed 
treaty because it assumed that the United States have no 
other or greater interest in it than France and England. If 



NO TRIPARTITE TREATY. 193 

the treaty should be assented to by the President, its certain 
rejection by the Senate would leave the question of Cuba more 
unsettled than when the arrangement was proposed. This, 
however, would not require the President to withhold his con- 
currence, if no other objections existed. But the convention 
would be of no value unless it were lasting; and the President 
did not consider it within the competence of the treaty-making 
power to bind the government for all time to come not to make 
a purchase of Cuba. ' He was likewise unwilling to depart from 
the traditionary policy of the government which had always 
been averse to political alliances with European powers. After 
statino- these preliminary objections, Mr. Everett, in his admir- 
able letter, goes on to say : 

"But the President has a graver objection to entering into 
the proposed convention. He has no wish to disguise the 
feeling that the compact, although equal in its terms, would be 
very unequal in substance. England and France by entering 
into it would disable themselves from obtaining possession of 
an island remote from their seats of government, belonging to 
another European power, whose natural right to possess it 
must always be as good as their own — a distant island in an- 
other hemisphere, and one which by no ordinary or peaceful 
course of things could ever belong to either of them. If the 
present balance of power in Europe should be broken up — if 
Spain should become unable to maintain the island in her pos- 
session, and England and France should be engaged in a death 
struggle with each other, Cuba might then be the prize of the 
victor. Till these events all take place, the President does not 
see how Cuba can belong to any European power but Spain. 
The United States, on the other hand, would by the proposed 
convention disable themselves from making an acquisition 
which might take place without any disturbance of existing 
foreign relations, and in the natural order of things. 

"The island of Cuba lies at our doors; it commands the 

approach to the Gulf of Mexico, which washes the shores 

of five of our States; it bars the entrance to that great river 

which drains half the North American continent, and, with its 

9 



194 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOIIE. 

tributaries, forms the largest system of internal water com- 
munication in the world; it keeps watch at the doorway of our 
intercourse with California by the Isthmus route. If an island 
like Cuba, belonging to the Spanish crown, guarded the en- 
trance to the Thames or the Seine, and the United States 
should propose a convention like this to England and France, 
those powers would assuredly feel that the disability a'^sumed 
by oui'selves was far less serious than that which we asked 
them to assume. 

"The opinion of American statesmen at different times, and 
under varying circumstances, have differed as to the desirable- 
ness of the acquisition of Cuba by the United States. Terri- 
torially and commercially, it would in our hands be an 
extremely valuable possession. Under certain contingencies, 
it might be almost essential to our safety; still, for domestic 
reasons on which, in a communication of this kind, it might not 
be proper to dwell, the President thinks that the incorporation 
of the island into the Union at the present time, although ef- 
fected with the consent of Spain, would be a hazardous meas- 
ure, and" he would consider its acquisition by force, except in 
a just war with Spain, should an event so greatly to be depre- 
cated take place, as a disgrace to the civilization of the age. 
The President has given ample proof of the sincerity with 
which he holds these views. He has thrown the whole force 
of his constitutional power against all illegal attacks upon the, 
island. It would have been perfectly easy for him, without 
any seeming neglect of duty, to allow projects of a formidable 
character to gather strength by connivance. No amount of 
obloquy at home, no embarrassments caused by the indiscre- 
tions of the colonial government of Cuba, have moved him from 
the path of duty. In this respect the Captain-general of tl)at 
island, an officer apparently of upright and conciliatory charac- 
ter, but probably more used to military command than the 
management of civil affairs, has, on a punctilio, in reference to 
the purser of a private steamship, who seems to have been en- 
tirely innocent of the matters laid to his charge, refused to 
allow passengers and the mails of the United States to be 
landed from a vessel having him on board. This certainly is 
a very extraordinary mode of animadverting upon a supposed 
abuse of the liberty of the press by the subject of a foreign 
government in his native country. The Captain-general is not 



MR. Everett's letter. 195 

permitted by his government, three thousand miles off, to hold 
any diplomatic intercourse with the United States. He is 
subject in no degree to the direction of the Spanish Minister at 
Washington; and the President has to choose between a resort 
to fo/ce tO' compel the abandonment of this gratuitous interrup- 
tion of commercial intercourse, which would result in a war — 
and a delay of weeks and months, necessary for a negotiation 
with Madrid, with all the chances of the most deplorable oc- 
currences in the interval, and all for a trifle, that ought to have 
admitted of a settlement by an exchange of notes between 
Washington and Havana. The President has, however, pa- 
tiently submitted to these evils, and has continued faithfully to 
give to Cuba the advantage of those principles of the public 
law under the shadow of which she has departed in this case 
from the comity of nations. But the incidents to which I al- 
lude, and which are still in train, are among many others which 
point decisively to the expediency of some change in the rela- 
tions of Cuba, and the President thinks that the influence of 
England and France with Spain, would be well employed in 
inducing her so to modify the administration of the government 
of Cuba as to afford the means of some prompt remedy for 
evils of the kind alluded to, which have done much to increase 
the spirit of unlawful enterprise against the island. That a 
convention, such as is proposed, would be a transitory arrange- 
ment, sure to be swept away by the irresistible tide of affairs 
in a new country, is to the apprehension of the President too 
obvious to require a labored argument. The project rests on 
principles, applicable, if at all, to Europe, where international 
relations are in their basis of great antiquity, slowly modified 
for the most part in the progress of time and events, and not 
applicable to America, which, but lately a waste, is filling up 
with intense rapidity and adjusting on natural principles those 
territorial relations which on the first discovery of the continent 
were in a good degree fortuitous. The comparative history of 
Europe and America, even for a single century, shows this. 

"In 1752, England, France, and Spain, were not materially 
different in their political position in Europe from what they 
now are. They were ancient, mature, consolidated States, es- 
tablished in their relations with each other and the rest of the 
world — the leading powers of Western and Southern Europe. 
Totally different was the state of things in America. The 



196 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

United States had no existence as a people — a line of English 
colonies not numbering* much over a million of inhabitants, 
stretched along the coast. France extended from the Bay of 
St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Alleghanies 
to the Mississippi, beyond which westward the continent was 
a wilderness, occupied by wandering savages, and subject to a 
conflicting and nominal claim on the part of France and Spain, 
Everything in Europe was comparatively fixed — everything 
in America provisional, incipient, and temporary, except the 
law of progress, which is as organic and vital in the youth of 
States, as of individual men. A struggle between the provin- 
cial authorities of England and France, for the possession of a 
petty stockade at the confluence of the Monongahela and the 
Alleghany, kindled the seven years' war, at the close of which, 
the great European powers, not materially affected in their 
relations at home, had undergone astonishing changes on this 
continent. France had disappeared from the map of America, 
whose inmost recesses had been penetrated by her zealous 
missionaries, and her resolute and gallant adventurers. Eng- 
land had added the Canadas to her transatlantic dominions. 
Spain had become the mistress of Louisiana, so that, in the 
language of the Archbishop of Mexico, in 1770, she claimed 
Siberia as the northern boundary of New Spain. 

"Twelve years only, from the treaty of Paris, elapsed, and 
another great change took place, fruitful of still greater changes 
to come. The American revolution broke out. It involved 
England, France, and Spain, in a tremendous struggle, and at 
its close the United States of America had taken their place 
in the family of nations. In Europe, the ancient States were 
restored substantially to their former equilibrium, but a new 
element, of incalculable importance in reference to territorial 
arrangements, is henceforth to be recognized in America. 
Just twenty years from the close of the war of the American 
revolution, France, by a treaty with Spain, of which the pro- 
visions have never been disclosed, possessed herself of Louisia- 
na, but did so only to cede it to the United States, and in the 
same year Lewis and Clark started on their expedition to plant 
the flag of the United States on the shores of the Pacific. In 
1819 Florida was sold by Spain to the United States, whose 
territorial possessions, in this way, had been increased three- 
fold in half a century. This last acquisition was so much a 



MK. Everett's letter. 197 

matter^of course that it had been distinctly foreseen by the 
Count Aranda, then Prime Minister of Spain, as long ago as 
1783. But even these momentous events are but the fore- 
runners of new territorial revolutions still more stupendous. 

"A dynastic struggle, between the Emperor Napoleon and 
Spain, commencing in 1808, convulsed the peninsula, the vast 
possessions of the Spanish crown on this continent, vice-royal- 
ties and captain-generalships filling the space between California 
and Cape Horn. One after another asserted their independ- 
ence; no friendly power in Europe, at that time, was able, or 
if able, was willing, to succor Spain or aid her to prop the 
crumbling buttresses of her colonial empire. So far from it, 
when France, in 1823, threw an army of one hundred thou- 
sand men into Spain, to control her domestic politics, England 
thought it necessary to counteract the movement by recogniz- 
ing the independence of the Spanish provinces in America; in 
the remarkable language of the distinguished minister of the 
day, in order to redress the balance of power in Europe, he 
called into existence a new world in the west, somewhat over- 
rating perhaps the extent of the derangement in the old world, 
and not doing full justice to the position of the United States 
in America, or their influence on the fortunes of their sister 
republics on this continent. 

"Thus, in sixty years from the close of the seven years' war, 
Spain, like France, had lost the last remains of her once im- 
perial possessions in this hemisphere. The United States, 
meantime, were, by the arts of peace and the healthful pro- 
gress of things, rapidly enlarging their dimensions and consol- 
idating their power. The great march of events still went on. 
Some of the new republics, from the effect of a mixture of races, 
or the want of training in liberal institutions, showed themselves 
incapable of self-government. The province of Texas revolted 
from Mexico by the same right by which Mexico revolted from 
Spain; at the memorable battle of San Jacinto, in 1836, she 
passed the great ordeal of nascent States, and her independ- 
ence was recognized by this government, by England, by 
France, and other European powers. Mainly peopled from 
the United States, she sought naturally to be incorporated 
into the Union. The otfer was repeatedly rejected by Presi- 
dents Jackson and Van Buren, to avoid a collision with Mexico. 
At last the annexation took place. As a domestic question, it 



198 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

is no fit subject for comment in a communication to a foreign 
minister; as a question of public law, tliere never was an ex- 
tension of territory more naturally or justifiably made; it pro- 
duced a disturbed relation with the government of Mexico; 
war ensued, and in its results other extensive territories were, 
for a large pecuniary compensation on the part of the United 
States, added to the Union. * 

"Without adverting to the divisions of opinion which aro^e 
in reference to this war — as must always happen in free coun- 
tries in reference to great measures — no person surveying 
these events with the eye of comprehensive statesmanship, can 
fail to trace in the main result the undoubted operation of the 
law of our political existence. The consequences are before 
the world ; vast provinces, which had languished for three cen- 
taries under the leaden sway of a stationary system, are coming 
under the influences of an active civilization, freedom of speech 
and the press — the trial by jury, religious equality, and rep- 
resentative government, have been carried by the constitution 
of the United States into extensive regions in which they were 
unknown before. By the settlement of California the great 
circuit of intelligence round the globe is completed. The dis- 
covery of the gold of that region, leading as it did to the same 
discovery in Australia, has touched the nerves of industry 
throughout the world." 

This fine picture of the territorial development of the United 
States, must gratify the pride of every patriotic heart. When 
Mr. Everett's letter was published in the newspapers, it was 
greeted with a universal expression of satisfaction. The whole 
country approved of the course of the President in repelling 
the 'impertinent attempts of foreign governments to impose 
diplomatic fetters on our future growth. The careful reader 
of the foregoing extract will have discovered in it a full recog- 
nition of one of the leading principles of the American party. 
In speaking of the melancholy fate of the republics of South 
America, Mr. Everett attributes the incapacity which their 
people had shown for self-government to " the eflfect of a mix- 
ture of races or the want of training in liberal institutions." 



AMERICAN PRINCIPLES. 199 

Knowing that like causes produce like effects, the American 
party are disposed to take warning from the anarchy and mis- 
rule which have prevailed in our sister republics of South 
America. 

The President, likewise, in his next annual message, which 
was presented to Congress a few days afterward, recognizes 
the principles of the American party, in stating the reasons 
why he did not consider the immediate acquisition of Cuba 
desirable. He said: "Were this island comparatively destitute 
of inhabitants, or occupied hy a kindred race, I should regard 
it, if voluntarily ceded by Spain, as a most desirable acquisition. 
But under existing circumstances I should look upon its incor- 
poration into our Union as a most hazardous measure. It 
would bring into the confederacy a population of a different 
national stock, speaking a different language, and not likely to 
harmonize with the other members. It would probably affect 
in a prejudicial manner the industrial interests of the South, 
and it might revive those conflicts of opinion between the dif- 
ferent sections of the country, which lately shook the Union to 
its center, and which have been so happily compromised.'* 
This extract shows how deeply Mr. Fillmore was even then 
impressed with the idea that the safety of our institutions 
depends on our being a homogeneous people. 



!J00 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 



CHAPTER XII. 



EXPLORING EXPEDITIONS TO FOREIGN COUNTRIES. 

The disbanding of the Mexican army had thrown upon the 
community a large number of idle but enterprising vagabonds, 
who were ready to engage in any plausible expedition that 
promised excitenient, notoriety, and plunder. The discovery 
of the gold mines of California had unsettled the public mind, 
and instead of seeking a gradual accumulation of wealth by 
the regular course of patient industry, the restless spirit of 
the country was growing wild in the pursuit of foreign 
enterprises. 

While, therefore, strong measures were necessary to pre- 
vent marauding expeditions against our peaceful neighbors, it 
seemed desirable to turn this spirit of enterprise to some good 
account, by fitting out exploring expeditions to foreign coun- 
tries, which should add to our geographical knowledge, extend 
our commerce, offer a field of enterprise to some of the most 
worthy of those who sought it, and present subjects of legiti- 
mate interest to occupy the public mind. With this view 
great efforts were made by the President to secure to our 
citizens the Tehuantepec route to the Pacific through Mexico, 
and the Nicaraugua route through Central America. 

Japan also attracted attention. Some of our sailors, who 
had been shipwrecked and cast upon her shores, were inhos- 
pitably treated; and the President determined to attempt a 
negotiation with that country for their protection, and for such 



EXPEDITION TO JAPAN. 201 

commercial privileges as could be obtained. With a view to 
open commercial intercourse with this empire, which had for 
several centuries been a sealed book to the various nations of 
the civilized world, the President ordered Commodore Aulick 
to the command of the East India squadron, and empowered 
him to open negotiations with Japan. We copy the following 
paragraphs from the letter of instructions to Commodore 
Aulick, which was drawn up by Mr. Webster: 

" The moment is near when the last link in the chain of 
oceanic steam navigation is to be formed. From China and 
the East Indies to Egypt; thence through the Mediterranean 
and the Atlantic ocean to England ; thence again to our 
happy shores, and other parts of this great continent; from 
our own ports to the southernmost part of the isthmus that 
connects the two western continents ; and from its Pacific 
coast, north and southward, as far as civilization has spread, 
the steamers of other nations, and of our own, carry intelli- 
gence, the wealth of the world, and thousands of travelers. 

"It is the President's opinion, that steps should be taken at 
once to enable our enterprising merchants to supply the last 
link in that great chain which unites all nations of the world, 
by the early establishment of a line of steamers from California 
to China. In order to facilitate this enterprise, it is desirable 
that we should obtain, from the Emperor of Japan, permission 
to purchase from his subjects the necessary supplies of coal, 
which our steamers, in their out and inward voyages, may 
require. The well known jealousy with which the Japanese 
Empire has, for the last two centuries, rejected all overtures 
from other nations to open its ports to their vessels, embar- 
rasses all new attempts to change the exclusive policy of that 
coun*y. 

********** 

" The President, although fully aware of the great reluc- 
tance hitherto shown by the Japanese government to enter 
into treaty stipulations with any foreign nation — a feeling 
which it is sincerely wished that you may be able to over- 
come — has thought it proper, in view of this latter favorable 
contingency, to invest you with full power to negotiate and 
0* 



202 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

sign a treaty of amity and commerce between the United 
States and the Empire of Japan." 

Commodore Aulick became involved in difficulty in conse- 
quence of alleged misconduct to the Brazilian minister, who 
was a passenger on board his vessel to Rio Janeiro. This 
difficulty resulted in his recall ; and it was afterward con- 
cluded to give a more imposing aspect to the mission by send- 
ing out an independent fleet, under the command of Commo- 
dore Perry, who was clothed with full powers of negotiation. 
The difficulty of obtaining sailors, and delay in finishing some 
vessels intended for the squadron, detained it in port till the 
fall of 1852, when it sailed from Norfolk with fewer vessels 
than had been intended. The success of the expedition, how- 
ever, was complete, and its history is to be found in the State 
and Navy Departments at Washington. 

As soon as Rosas was driven from Buenos Ayres, and a 
prospect began to dawn of opening to the commerce of other 
nations the immense country bordering on the La Plata and 
its confluents, our ministers at Rio and Buenos Ayres were 
directed to go to the seat of power wherever it should be 
found, whether in a confederation or in separate states, and 
negotiate treaties of amity and commerce. Treaties had 
already been made during this administration, with Peru, Costa 
Rica, Uraouay, and Brazil; and the ministers just alluded to 
secured others. In furtherance of the same object the Presi- 
dent sent one of our naval officers, with a small stean^r, to 
survey the La Plata and its branches. 

Inferring from the gold washings of the rivers of Africa, 
that when the interior mountains in which they take their rise 
are discovered and examined, they may prove to be another 
California ; and believing that, if the conjecture were con- 
firmed, the existence of gold mines would act as a power- 
ful motive in inducing the free blacks of this country to 



SOUTH AMERICAN EXPLORING EXPEDITIONS. 203 

emigrate to that part of the world, Lieutenant Lynch was sent 
thither on an exploring expedition, the result of which has 
not "yet been published. Like the reports of the Japan expe- 
dition, it sleeps in the archives of the Navy Department at 
Washington. 

By the act of August 31st, 1852, Congress provided for 
an exploring expedition to the Chinese seas, which was dis- 
patched by the President under Captain Ringgold, who was 
sent home insane before the completion of the survey. 

An expedition was also se£t to explore the valley of the 
Amazon, which accomplished its object. The reports of the 
officers in command, which are printed among the Senate 
documents, are well worthy a perusal. 

Efforts were also made to open the guano trade, which is a 
monopoly ; and an unfortunate letter was written by the Secre- 
tary of State to Mr. Jewett; and, without the knowledge of 
the President, an order was sent to Commodore McAuley to 
protect our vessels in taking guano from the Lobos Islands. 
As soon as the President discovered it, the order was counter- 
manded, and an arrangement was made with the Peruvian 
government to freight the vessels which had been sent out at 
a stipulated price. 

The various expeditions to which allusion has been made in 
this chapter show that the administration of President Fill- 
more was characterized not less by enterprise than by wise 
and salutary caution, and that he fully sympathized with the 
progressive spirit of the age, whenever its indulgence was con- 
sistent with our obligations to others. This happy union of 
enterprise without rashness, with caution without timidity, is 
as rare as it is fortunate, and entitles Mr. Fillmore to the very 
first rank as a practical statesman. Firm when a right is in- 
volved; bold when occasion demands; far-sighted respecting 
the consequences of measures; quick to perceive where an 
advantage is to be gained for his country; cool, sagacious. 



204 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

deliberate, and inflexibly just, he combines more of the requisites 
for a great and able chief magistrate than any other man in 
the country. Others may possess single qualifications in 
greater perfection, and therefore be regarded as more brilliant ; 
but no one combines so many of the requisites for eminent 
usefulness in the discharge of high and responsible trusts. 



AMERICAN PRINCIPLES. 205 



CHAPTER XIII. 

AMERICAN PRINCIPLES. 

The limits to which we are restricted do not permit a detailed 
account of all the measures of President Fillmore's adminis- 
tration. A number of domestic reforms, of which the reduc- 
tion of letter postage to the uniform rate of three cents, may 
be considered a specimen, are necessarily passed over without 
mention, in order that we may present with more fullness some 
of those prominent features of Mr. Fillmore's policy which 
afford criterions of his wisdom and ability as a statesman. 

After the passage of the compromise measures, no event 
occurred during the administration of Mr. Fillmore, which pro- 
duced so profound a sensation, and awakened so much popular 
excitement, as the visit to this country of Louis Kossuth, the 
ex-governor of Hungary. The participation of the adminis- 
tration in measures for the release of the Hungarian exiles 
from their imprisonment in Turkey, and its refusal to partici- 
pate in measures for rescuing fallen Hungary from the do- 
minion of Austria, furnish illustrations of Mr. Fillmore's tone 
of thinking on questions pertaining to immigration and foreign 
influence, and will enable the reader to understand why he so 
jjromptly perceived the importance of the American move- 
ment, and so readily united with the American party. Mr. 
Fillmore's accession to this party was a necessary consequence 
of principles he had entertained and acted upon before the 
party had risen into notice. 



206 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

The American party is not founded, as its enemies repre- 
sent, on hostility to the residence of foreigners in this country, 
but to their participation in our politics before they have be- 
come imbued with American sentiments. The American party 
cherishes a lively sympathy with all efforts in favor of free 
institutions in other countries, and cordially welcomes to our 
shores the oppressed inhabitants of the old world, who have 
either failed in such efforts, or, from any other cause, seek 
protection and repose for themselves, and a home for their 
posterity, in this free and happy republic. Our right to watch 
the progress of liberty in other lands, to sympathize with its 
struggles, and to recognize its achievements, was nobly and 
eloquently vindicated by President Fillmore's administration, 
in Mr. Webster's celebrated letter to the Chevalier Hulse- 
mann, which was written by the direction of the President. 
The following extracts will show that the policy of strict neu- 
trality and non-intervention, which was so firmly enforced 
during Mr. Fillmore's administration, was not the fruit of cold 
indifference to the fortunes of freedom on the eastern continent. 

"The undersigned will first observe," says Mr. Webster, 
" that the President is persuaded, his majesty the emperor of 
Austria does not think that the government of the United 
States ought to view, with unconcern, the extraordinary events 
which have occurred, not only in his dominions, but in many 
other parts of Europe, since February, 1848. The govern- 
ment and people of the United States, like other intelligent 
governments and communities, take a lively interest in the 
movements and events of this remarkable age, in whatever 
part of the world they may be exhibited. But the interest 
taken by the United States in those events, has not pro- 
ceeded from any disposition to depart from that neutrality 
toward foreign powers, which is among the deepest principles 
and the most cherished traditions of the political history of 
the Union. It has been the necessary effect of the unex- 
ampled character of the events themselves, which could not 
fail to arrest the attention of the cotemporary world; as they 



SYMPATHY WITH STKUGGLING FREEDOM. 207 

will doubtless fill a memorable page in history. But the 
undersigned goes further, and freely admits that in proportion 
as these extraordinary events appeared to have their origin in 
those great ideas of responsible and popular governments, on 
which the American constitutions themselves are wholly 
founded, they could not but command the warm sympathy of 
the people of this country. 

" The power of this republic, at the present moment, is 
spread over a region, one of the richest and most fertile on the 
globe, and of an extent in comparison with which the posses- 
sions of the House of Hapsburg are but as a patch on the 
earth's surface. Its population, already twenty-five millions, 
vsili exceed that of the Austrian empire within the period 
during which it may be hoped that Mr. Hulsemann may yet 
remain in the honorable discharge of his duties to his govern- 
ment. Its navigation and commerce are hardly exceeded by 
the oldest and most commercial nations ; its maritime means 
and its maritime power may be seen by Austria herself, in all 
seas where she has ports, as well as it may be seen, also, in 
all other quarters of the globe. Life, liberty, property, and 
all personal rights, are amply secured to all citizens, and pro- 
tected by just and stable laws; and credit, public and private, 
is as well established as in any government of Continental 
Europe. And the country, in all its interests and concerns, 
partakes most largely in all the improvements and progress 
which distinguish the age. Certainly the United States may 
be pardoned, even by those who profess adherence to the 
principles of absolute governments, if they entertain an ardent 
atfection for those popular forms of political organization which 
have so rapidly advanced their own prosperity and happiness; 
which enabled them, in so short a period, to bring their coun- 
try, and the hemisphere to which it belongs, to the notice and 
respectful regard, not to say the admiration, of the ci\ilized 
world. Nevertheless, the United States have abstained, at all 
times, from acts of interference with the political changes of 
Europe. They can not, however, fail to cherish always a 
lively interest in the fortunes of nations struggling for institu- 
tions like their own. But this sympathy, so far from being 
necessarily n hostile feeling toward any of the parties to these 
great national struggles, is quite consistent with amicable rela- 
tions with them all. The Hungarian people are three or four 



208 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLAR!; FILLMORE. 

times as numerous as the inbabitants of these United States 
were when the American revolution broke out. They possess, 
in a distinct language, and in other respects, important ele- 
ments of a separate nationality, which the Anglo-Saxon race 
in this country did not possess; and if the United States wish 
success to countries contending for popular constitutions and 
national independence, it is only because they regard such 
constitutions and such national independence, not as imaginary, 
but as real blessings. They claim no right, however, to take 
part in the struggles of foreign powers in order to promote 
these ends. It is only in defense of his own government, and 
its principles and character, that the undersigned has now ex- 
pressed himself on this -subject. But when the United States 
behold the people of foreign countries, without any such inter- 
ference, spontaneously moving toward the adoption of institu- 
tions like their own, it surely can not be expected of them to 
remain wholly indiflferent spectators." 

A proof of the sincerity with which these sentiments were 
entertained is furnished by the subsequent action of Mr. Fill- 
more's administration in relation to Kossuth. When he was 
an exile and a prisoner in the Turkish dominions, the Secre- 
tary of State was directed to write a letter to Mr. Marsh, the 
American minister at Constantinople, instructing him to apply 
to the Sublime Porte for the release of the Hungarian refugees, 
and to offer them a passage to this country in national vessels. 
The most prominent of the reasons for their release, which 
were urged in that letter, was the great improbability of their 
renewing any attempts tending to disturb the tranquillity of 
the old world. They were invited and welcomed here as men 
who sought an asylum from oppression, and without the most 
distant expectation that Kossuth and his companions would 
traverse the country with the avowed purpose of subverting 
the settled policy of the American government. 

"But at this time," says the letter of instructions, "all 
possible apprehension of danger and disturbance, to result 'from 
their liberation, has ceased. 



LOUIS KOSSUTH. 209 

" It is now more than a year since the last Hungarian army 
surrendered, and the attempts at revolution and the estabUsh- 
ment of an independent government, in which they wore en- 
gaged, were most sternly crushed by the united forces of two 
of the greatest powers of Europe. 

"Their chief associates are, like themselves, in exile, or they 
have perished on the field, or on the scaflfold, or by military 
execution ; their estates are confiscated, their families dispersed, 
and every castle, fortress, and city of Hungary is in the pos- 
session of the forces of Austria. 

"They themselves, by their desire to remove so far from 
the scene of their late conflict, declare that they entertain no 
hope or thought of other similar attempts, and wish only to 
be permitted to withdraw themselves altogether from all 
European associations, and seek new homes in the vast regions 
of the United States. 

" For their attempts at independence they have most dearly 
paid; and now, broken in fortune and in heart, without home 
or country — a band of exiles whose only future is a fearful 
remembrance of the past; whose only request is to spend 
their remaining days in obscure industry — they want the per- 
mission of his imperial majesty to remove themselves, and all 
that may remain to them, across the ocean to the uncultivated 
regions of America, and leave forever a continent which has 
become more gloomy than the wilderness, more lone and 
dreary than the desert." 

Ko foreigner ever approached our hospitable shores who 
excited so much interest and sympathy as was felt for Kos- 
suth. Little was it dreamed that in the very act of accepting 
our hospitality he would turn our accuser. Little was it 
thought that he would immediately arraign our government 
as recreant to the cause of universal liberty, because it adhered 
to the wise policy of Washington, and declined to take part in 
the struggles of foreign nations. Little was it supposed that 
this illustrious Hungarian exile would appeal from the Ameri- 
can government to the American people, and attempt to com- 
pel acquiescence in his schemes by influencing the presidential 
election. But, httle as it was expected, all ^this turned out to 



210 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

be true. No one can have forgotten the effect produced on 
the public mind by Kossuth's seductive eloquence. If, during 
the two or three weeks when the excitement was at its height, 
the proposal to a;bandon the neutral policy of the government 
could have been decided by a popular vote, there would 
probably have been a large majority in favor of Kossuth. 
Happily, by the firmness of the government, and the returning 
good sense of the peopk, this dangerous mania subsided, and 
gradually disappeared; and Kossuth, who was received on his 
arrival with great ovations, became so unpopular before he left 
the country, that he deemed it prudent to engage his passage 
on board the steamer under an assumed name. 

His visit to this country was calculated to lead thoughtful 
minds to reflect on the growing danger of foreign influence. 
Had the President shown any marks of sympathy with the 
popular excitement which, for several weeks, ran so high, there 
is no doubt that the foreign policy of the government would 
have undergone a complete revolution. Mr. Clay, who was 
then living, fully coincided in the views of the President, and 
in his interview with Kossuth explained, with his accustomed 
eloquence, the reasons why it was not expedient for our gov- 
ernment to embark in the cause of Hungary. Colonel Benton, 
in addressing a meeting of citizens in Missouri, paid a deserved 
tribute to Mr. Fillmore and Mr. Clay, in connection with this 
subject. " I am opposed," said Colonel Benton, " to interven- 
ing, and under all its forms ; and as much as any, in the form 
of 'protest,' to be unsupported by acts if the protest should 
be disregarded. Of the eminent public men of our country 
who have accosted this question most to my satisfaction, Mr. 
Fillmore and Mr. Clay are the two foremost; they have givea 
It a prompt and unqualified opposition in all its forms. This, in 
my opinion, is the American position." 

When Kossuth had failed in his application to the American 
government, and in his appeal to the great body of the Ameri- 



FOREIGN INFLUENCE. 211 

can people, he attempted to carry out his project by operating 
on the prejudices of our foreign-born citizens. His efforts in 
this direction afford a striking illustration of the dangers which 
result from having a large body of voters in our midst, whose 
political sympathies are more fully given to the revolutionary 
movements of the old world than to the institutions of their 
adopted country. In a speech to German citizens in the city 
of :N'ew York, on the 14th of June, 1852, Kossuth said: 

'' You are strong enough to effect the election of that candi- 
date for the Presidency who gives the most attention to the 
European cause. I find that quite natural, because between 
both parties there is no difference as regards the internal 
policy, and because only by the inanity of the German citizens 
of this country, the election will be such that, by and by, the 
administration will turn their attention to other countries, and 
give every nation free scope. No tree, my German friends, 
falls with the first stroke ; it is therefore necessary that, inas- 
much as you ore citizens, and can command your votes, you 
support the candidate who ivill jmrsiie the external policy in 
our sense, and endeavor to effect that all nations become free 
and independent, such as is the case in happy America." 

On the 23d of the same month, Kossuth addressed a large 
assemblage of Germans at the Broadway Tabernacle. After 
the close of his speech a series of resolutions were adopted, 
of w^hich the following are specimens: 

^'Resolved, That, as American citizens, we will attach our- 
selves to the Democratic party, and will devote our strength to 
having a policy of intervention in America carried out. 

" Resolved, That we expect that the candidate of the Demo- 
cratic party will adopt the principles of this policy, which has 
been sanctioned by all distinguished statesmen of his party. 

^^ Resolved, That we protest against the manner in which, 
heretofore, the government of the United States has inter- 
preted and appHed the policy of neutrality, which is in viola- 
tion of the spirit of the constitution of the United States. 



212 BIOGRAPHY OF MILLARD FILLMORE. 

"■Resolved, That we ask that every American citizen, not 
being attached to the soil, may support the strength of any 
other people in the sense as the juries have interpreted the 
principles of the American constitution, and especially of the 
policy of neutrality." 

A few days afterward, Kossuth prepared a secret circular, 
which commenced as follows: 

New York, June 28th, 1852. 

"Sir: — I hope you have read already my German farewell 
speech, delivered June 23d, in the Tabernacle at New York, 
and also the resolutions of the meeting, which were passed 
consequently. 

" I hope, further, that the impression which this matter has 
made upon both political parties has not escaped your attention. 

" Indeed, it is not easy to be mistaken, thai the German 
citizens of America will have the casting vote in the coming 
election, if they are united in a joint direction upon the plat- 
form of the principles set forth in the speech aforementioned. 

" They may decide upon the exterior policy of the next 
administration of the United States, and with that upon the 
triumph or the ftill of liberty in Europe." 

No careful reader of these extracts can fail to perceive that 
they disclose a method by which the presidential election of 
this country might be carried, and the policy of the govern- 
ment controlled by persons of foreign birth and sympathies. 
The only sure preventive of so great an evil is to exclude from 
any share in the government all except citizens who are thor- 
oughly imbued with American sentiments. 

After the close of Mr. Fillmore's administration, it was his 
intention, before returning to his home in Buffalo, to comply 
with numerous invitations he had received to visit the South, 
But severe domestic affliction compelled him to postpone this 
intention, and it was not till the spring of 1854 that he was able 
to make the proposed tour. He then visited all the principiil 
south-western and southern cities, and was everywhere received 



MR. Fillmore's Americanism. 213 

with demonstrations of respect and welcome, more spontaneous, 
cordial and extensive tTian had ever before been bestowed on 
a private citizen. In the summer of that year Mr. Fillmore 
was compelled again to drink deep of the cup of affliction, and 
some months afterward he was induced to seek relief from the 
loneliness of a home which death had rendered nearly deso- 
late, by a visit to the old world. During the season of retire- 
ment and domestic grief which preceded his embarkation for 
Europe, Mr. Fillmore took no active part in politics, beyond 
the exercise of the citizen's right of voting. When the Ameri- 
can party arose, he approved of its objects, afid, in the first 
election in which he had an opportunity to do so, voted for its 
candidates. In the early part of the year 1855, he formally 
united with the American party, and assumed its obligations. 
How fully he appreciated the necessity of the American move- 
ment, and endorsed the principles in which it had its origin, 
may be seen in the following private letter, written to a friend 
in Philadelphia: 

" Buffalo, New York, Jan. 3d, 1855. 
** Respected Friend Isaac Newton — 

" It would give me great pleasure to accept your kind in- 
vitation to visit Philadelphia, if it were possible to make my 
visit private, and limit it to a few personal friends whom I 
should be most happy to see. But I know that this would 
be out of my power; and I am therefore reluctantly compelled 
to decline your invitation, as I have done others to New York 
and Boston for the same reason. 

" I return you many thanks for your information on the 
subject of politics. I am always happy to hear what is going- 
forward ; but, independently of the fact that I feel myself with- 
drawn from the political arena, I have been too much depressed 
m spirit to take an active part in the late elections. I con- 
tented myself with giving a silent vote for Mr. Uilman for 
governor. 

" W hile, however, I am an inactive observer of public events, 
I am by no means an indifferent one ; and I may say to you, 
in the frankness of private friendship, I have for a long time 



214 BIOOEAPHY OF MILLAED FILLMOEE. 

looked with dread and apprehension at the corrupting influence 
which the contest for the foreign vote is exciting upon our 
elections. This seems to result from its being banded together, 
and subject to the control of a few interested and selfish 
leaders. Hence, it has been a subject of bargain and sale, 
and each of the great political parties of the country have been 
bidding to obtain it; and, as usual in all such contests, the 
party which is most corrupt is most successful. The conse- 
quence is, that it is fast demoralizing the whole country; cor- 
rupting the very fountains of political power; and converting 
the ballot-box — that great palladium of our liberty — into an 
unmeaning mockery, where the rights of native-born citizens 
are voted away by those who blindly follow their mercenary 
and selfish leaders. The evidence of this is found not merely 
in the shameless chaffering for the foreign vote at every elec- 
tion, but in the large disproportion of offices which are now 
held by foreigners, at home and abroad, as compared with our 
native citizens. Where is the true-hearted American whose 
cheek does not tingle with shame and mortification, to see our 
highest and most coveted foreign missions tilled by men of 
foreign birth, to the exclusion of native born ? Such appoint- 
ments are a humiliating confession to the crowned heads of 
Europe, that a republican soil does not produce sufficient 
talent to represent a republican nation at a monarchical court. 
I confess that it seems to me, with all due respect to others, 
that, as a general rule, our country should be governed by 
American-born citizens. Let us give to the oppressed of every 
country an asylum and a home in our happy land; give to all 
the benefits of equal laws and equal protection; but let us at 
the same time cherish as the apple of our eye tl^e great prin- 
ciples of constitutional liberty, which few who have not had 
the good fortune to be reared in a free country know how to 
appreciate, and still less how to preserve. 

"Washington, in that inestimable legacy which he left to his 
country — his farewell address — has wisely warned us to 
beware of foreign influence as the most baneful foe of a repub- 
lican government. He saw it, to be sure, in a different light 
from that in which it now presents itself; but he knew that it 
would approach in all forms, and hence he cautioned us against 
the insidious wiles of its influence. Therefore, as well for our 
own sakes, to whom this invaluable inheritance of self-govern- 



JAN ii 81949 



AMEKICAX J'RINCIPLES. 215 

merit has been left by our forefathers, as for the sake of the 
unborn millions who are to inherit this land — foreign and 
native — let us take warning of the father of his country, and 
do what we can to preserve our institutions from corruption, 
and our country from dishonor; but let this be done by the 
people themselves in their sovereign capacity, by makino- a 
proper discrimination in the selection of officers, and not by 
depriving any individual, native or foreign-born, of any con- 
stitutional or legal right to which he is now entitled. 

" These are my sentiments in brief; and although I have 
sometimes almost despaired of my country, when 1 have wit- 
nessed the rapid strides of corruption, yet I think I perceive a 
gleam of hope in the future, and I now feel confident that, 
when the great mass of intelligence in this enlightened country 
is once fully aroused, and the danger manifested, it will fear- 
lessly apply the remedy, and bring back the government to 
the pure days of Washington's administration. Finally, let us 
adopt the old Roman motto, * Never despair of the republic' 
Let us do our duty, and trust in that providence which has 
so signally watched over and preserved us, for the result. 
But 1 have said more than I intended, and much more than I 
should have said to any one but a trusted friend, as I have 
no desire to mingle in political strife. Remember me kindly 
to your family, and, believe me, 

" I am truly yours, 

"Millard Fillmore." 



^BIOGRAPHY 



MILLARD FILLMORE. 



BUFFALO: 
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